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ANNAPOLIS 

FEINTED FOE THE COLLEGE 

NOVEMBEE, 1909 






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St. Jolin's College, at Annapolis, the alma mater of so many of 
Maryland's most noted and honored sons, is charmingly situated on 
the banks of the Severn Eiver, a few miles from the Chesapeake Bay, 
Nothing in the country surpasses the picturesque beauty of its situation. 

It reaches back in the continuity of its records to the earliest colonial 
times. The first effort to establish a college in Maryland was made by 
the General Assembly, convened in the City of St. Mary's in the year 
1671. An Act was then passed by the Upper House of Assembly, for 
'* founding and erecting a school or college for the education of youth 
in learning and virtue." 

This Act was returned by the Lower House with certain amend- 
ments providing for the differences in religious views existing at that 
time among the people, w^hich amendments were not acceptable to the 
Upper House, and there the Bill rested. 

In 1694, the then Governor, Sir Francis Nicholson, sent a message 
to the Legislature proposing ' ' that a way may be found for the build- 
ing of a free school for the province," and offering to give money for 
its maintenance. The plan was approved, and the General Assembly 
offered subscriptions of tobacco. No further action was taken at this 
time, but in 1696 an Act was passed which resulted in the establish- 
ment of King William's School. This Act recites that the school was 
established for '' the propagation of the gospel and education of youth 
in good letters and manners. ' ' It was addressed to ' ' His most excel- 
lent Majesty, etc., Dread Sovereign William III of England." This 
law further enacted that " the most Reverend Father in God, Thomas, 
by Divine Providence, Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate and 
Metropolitan of all England, may be Chancellor of said school, and that 
to perpetuate the memory of your Majesty, it may be called King 
William 's School. ' ' 

The Reverend Dr. Bray, who had been appointed Commissary of 
Maryland by the Bishop of London, and who is said to have been the 
originator of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, was mainly 
instrumental in obtaining this said Act. 

King William's School was thus established. Governor Nicholson gave 
to the school a lot in the town of Annapolis, with the house thereon, 
and the Legislature appropriated money to it, but the school-house was 
not finished until 1701. It was of brick, and stood on the south side 
of the State House. 

In 1784 the charter of St. John's College was granted, two years 
after a like charter had been given for the establishment of Washington 
College at Chestertown, on the Eastern Shore. 



4 Historical Sketch 

It was intended by the terms of tlie charter that the two colleges 
thus founded should constitute one university under the name of the 
University of Maryland. 

By Act, 1785, the proj^erty and funds and students of King Wil- 
liam ^s School were conveyed to St. John's College. 

Among the chattels passed to the college were a number of ^' quaint 
and curious volumes " brought over by the Eev. Dr. Bray from Eng- 
land, and which still remain in the library of St. John's. 

On November 11, 1789, the college was formally opened, and the 
dedication was performed with much solemnity, all the public bodies 
being in attendance, and forming a long procession from State House 
to College Hall. The first president of the College vras the Eev. J, Mc- 
Dowell, LL. D. 

Among the students of that early period are to be found the names 
of George Washington Parke Custis, and Fairfax and Lawrence Wash- 
ington, nephews of George Washington; also, of Francis Scott Key, who 
entered St. John's November 11, 1789, and graduated in 1796. 

On Friday morning, March 25, 1791, President Y/ashington, attended 
by the Governor of Maryland and a number of citizens, visited St. John's 
College, and expressed much satisfaction at the appearance of this rising 
institution. 

In 1807 Eev. Dr. Bethel Judd v/as chosen principal, and the v^^ork, 
though grievously hampered by the action of the Legislature, was par- 
tially continued, and in January, 1812, $1,000 of the annuity, which 
had been withdrawn by the Legislature in January, 1806, was restored. 
A lottery granted in 1821 added $20,000 to the funds, and enabled the 
College to extend its work. Eev. Henry Lyon Davis served as principal 
from 1820 to 1824, and the Eev. Dr. William Eafferty from 1824 to 
1831. In 1831 Eev. Dr. Hector Humphreys was appointed principal, 
and by his persevering efforts and personal influence with the members 
of the Legislature, a sum of $3,000 was added to the annuity, provided 
the Board of Visitors and Governors should agree to accept it "in full 
satisfaction of all legal or equitable claims, that they might have or be 
supposed to have against the State. ' ' 

Dr. Humphreys was succeeded by Eev. C. K. Nelson. He guided the 
College successfully till 1861, when the College buildings were utilized 
as a military hospital by the United States Army until the close of 
the war. 

After the war the College buildings were put in thorough repair, and 
Dr. Henry Barnard, of Connecticut, late Commissioner of Education, 
was elected principal, and the College was reopened in September, 1866. 
On his resignation, the following summer. Dr. James C. Welling, after- 
wards president of Columbian University, Washington, D. C, was chosen 
principal, and the College opened in the autumn with 115 students. 
Before the close of the next session, the Board of Visitors and Governors, 
in recognition of an increased annuity, passed an ordinance establishing 
150 State scholarships, each scholarship entitling the holder to exemption 



Historical Sketch 5 

from the payment of room rent and tuition fees in any department of 
the College, and the nmnber of students in attendance increased to 225. 
Dr. Welling resigned at the close of the session 1869-70, and Dr. James 
M. Garnett, afterwards professor of English at the University of Vir- 
ginia, was appointed in his stead. Under his administration, in 1871, 
the first class since 1860 was graduated, and continuously thereafter, 
classes have been duly graduated each year. In 1880 Dr. James M. 
Garnett, with other members of the faculty, tendered their resignations, 
which were accepted by the Board of Visitors, and the Eev. Dr. J. M. 
Leavitt was invited to undertake the administrative duties of the 
College. 

In the summer of 1884 Dr. Leavitt resigned, and went abroad for his 
health, and Prof. William H. Hopkins, subsequently appointed President 
of the Woman's College, Baltimore, Md., was installed as acting princi- 
pal. He maintained control during the sessions of 1884-85 and 1885-86, 
but in spite of strenuous efforts on his part to ameliorate the condition 
of things, no appreciable progress was made. Under his direction and 
personal efforts the detail of an officer from the United States Army, 
and also of an Engineer from the United States Navy, were obtained, 
in accordance with the provisions of certain Acts of Congress, with the 
conditions of which St. John's was able to comply. 

He resigned in the summer of 1886, to accept the position offered to 
him by the trustees of the Woman's College, Baltimore, Md., and 
Dr. Thomas Fell was called to occupy the presidential chair. 

On the 26th of June, 1889, the College celebrated the One Hundredth 
Anniversary of its existence under the title of St. John's College. Many 
of the old students returned for the occasion, and friends who had not 
met for years exchanged the heartiest greetings. Owing to the large 
assemblage of visitors a tent was erected on the campus, in the shade 
of the famous old poplar tree, where the literary features of the program 
were carried out. 

Toward the close of 1891 the Board of Visitors authorized President 
Fell to initiate a movement for the formation of an endowTiient fund. 
In pursuance of this object he has met with much success, and as one 
of the results of his efforts in this direction, has paid off a mortgage 
debt of $30,000, incurred by reinstating and equipping the College after 
the Civil War. 

In 1901, a new scientific building was erected and dedicated to the 
memory of Henry Williams Woodward, the father of James T. Wood- 
ward, President of the Hanover Bank, New York. And in 1904 a dining- 
hall and a new dormitory for students was added to the group of 
buildings. 

In 1905, Mr. Andrew Carnegie made a donation for the erection of 
a new building on the campus, which has not yet been built. 

In January, 1907, an affiliation was formed with the University of 
Maryland, . making St. John 's College the Department of Arts and 
Sciences of the University. The combined schools are directed by a 



6 Historical Sketch 

Council of eight (two from St. John 's College, two from the Law School, 
two from the Medical School, and one each from the Schools of Dentisty 
and Pharmacy), of which the Governor of Maryland is, ex-officio, the 
Chairman, with the title of Chancellor, the Honorable Bernard Carter 
the Pro-Chancellor and Dr. Thomas Fell, President of St. John's College, 
the Vice-Chancellor. 

By this affiliation, a year of the time required to take the academic 
course and the professional course in any of the schools may be saved. 

In 1908 a large new Gymnasium was erected, covering a ground space 
of 158 feet by 97 feet. The main gymnasium room is surrounded by a 
gallery containing a running track, and there are bowling alleys, a rifle 
range, reading room, trophy room, as well as the various other separate 
apartments for offices, etc., required in such a building. Adjoining, is 
a swimming pool, with a large shower bath and lavatory attached; also 
a large spare room. 

In 1909 a severe misfortune befell the College in the burning of 
McDowell Hall, the most valuable of all the buildings, both in traditional 
association and in intrinsic worth. This building was begun in 1744 as 
a residence for a Colonial Governor, and was presented by the State for 
educational purposes in 1784. 



At a meeting of the Board of Visitors and Governors held on the 
sixth of January, 1909, it was resolved that the Celebration of the One 
Hundredth and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of the College should be duly 
observed during Commencement Week, and, in order to facilitate the 
preparation of the necessary arrangements, a Committee consisting of 
Messrs. James A. Fechtig, L. Dorsey Gassaway and Louis T. Clark was 
appointed. 

Under the auspices of the above Committee, other committees of 
alumni were added, to co-operate in making the Celebration a success. 
Meetings were held from time to time in Baltimore, at which plans 
were discussed and a general programme finally decided upon. 

GENERAL COMMITTEES 

THE BOARD OF VISITORS 

James A. Fechtig, Jr., '95 (Chairman) 
L. Dorset Gassaway, '81 Louis T. Clark, '92 

RECEPTION 

B. Vernon Cecil, '90 John L. Chew, 87 James M. Munroe, 74 
Hon. Eobert Moss Eidgely P. Melvin, '99 

ALUMNI 

Henry D. Harlan, 78 W. Thomas Kemp, '97 (Sec'y) 

John T. Harrison, '07 

speakers 

Philemon H. Tuck, '72 Walter I. Dawkins, '80 

L. B. Keene Claggett, '95 

invitations 

Daniel E. Eandall, '83 Frank H. Stockett 

A. W. Woodcock, '03 

OUTDOOR 

E. B. Iglehakt, '94 Nicholas H. Geeen, '89 

EiCHARD H. Duvall Evelyn Harrison, '06 



pr0rp?Jittt90 



The first movement toward the Celebration was the transfer of the 
student battalion to the encampment, which was placed in the Athletic 
Field, thus making room in the buildings for the reception of alumni 
and other visitors. 

FRIDAY, JUNE 11 

In the evening, the Annual Oratorical Contest of the Junior Class 
took place in the New Gymnasium. The following was the programme : 

1. ' ' The Confessional " Anon. 

Charles A. Mullikin, Trappe, Md. 

2. ' * The Eace Problem " Grady 

Webster S. Blades, Choptank, Md. 

3. ' ' William McKinley " Kay 

Thomas B. Mudd, LaPlata, Md. 

4. '■ ' Vindication ' ' Emmett 

Leonard Kolmer, Lonaconing, Md. 

5. ' ' The New South " Grady 

Edgar Hauver, Myersville, Md. 

Judges — Professors C. W. Stryker, A. W. Woodcock, E. H. Sirich. 

The contest was won by Mr. W, S. Blades, to whom was awarded the 
gold medal offered by President Fell. 

SATURDAY, JUNE 12 

The first social event of the Celebration was the dance given by the 
Philomathean and Philokalian Societies jointly. The guests were re- 
ceived by Lieutenant and Mrs. E. B. Iglehart, and the music was 
furnished by a string orchestra of the Naval Academy Band. 



SUNDAY, JUNE 13 

The Faculty of the College, the Graduating Class, and the whole body 
of students assembled at Woodward Hall and marched from there in a 
body to St. Anne's Church, where they were joined by several members 
of the Board of Visitors and Governors. 



10 St. John's College Commencement and 

The order of the service was as follows: 

Processional Hymn, 311 — '' Ancient of Days," 

Morning Prayer. 

Introit, Hymn 493. 

Ante Communion. 

Hymn before Sermon, 249. 

Sermon by Eev. Ernest M. Stires, D. D., Eector of St. Thomas's 
Church, New York City. 

Anthem — ' ' Love Divine All Love Excelling. ' ' 

Processional Hymn, 510. 

Order of Procession: Choristers, Graduating Class of St. John's Col- 
lege, Faculty of St. John's College, Visiting Clergy, Clergy of St. Anne's 
Parish, Eector of St. Anne's Parish and the President of St. John's 
College. 

SEEMON BY DE. E. M. STIEES 

First Corinithians xiv, 8: " For if the trumpet give an uncertain 
sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle. ' ' 

Dr. Stires said in part: 

It is a privilege to be here, and to have been invited to preach the 
baccalaureate sermon to the graduates of such an old, historic College 
as St. John's, one that has sent forth great men, who have served their 
country faithfully, and have been an inspiration to those who have come 
after. Such an inspiration also is the keeping of this One Hundred and 
Twenty-Fifth Anniversary, bringing to mind the deeds of those who 
have gone before, and the call to those who are now making the record 
of the future. 

There is need today of the revival of those principles that have made 
our country great. As the historic tree of St. John's Campus has been 
strengthened and saved for this generation and for those to come, so, it 
is possible to save from the ravages of materialism and radicalism those 
principles that have done this great work in the past. St. Paul was a 
man of wisdom, and it is not strange that we should have militant words 
from his lips. The trumpet call is, in itself, a sentence. Life is a 
'battle, but it does not mean that happiness and joy are not to be found 
in life. 

If the trumpet give uncertain sounds it may be for various reasons: 
perhaps the trumpeter did not hear the officer 's commands, perhaps he 
feared or had doubts, or, perhaps his heart was not in his work. 

The cry of the world is for leadership, for manhood. Young men of 
today lack enthusiasm, but there are not a great many men who are sin- 
ning deliberately against the right, and the saddest tragedy in human 
life is when a man believes in God and yet sins against him, against his 
fellow men and against himself, who does not by word or deed help 
others to conform to the Word of God. To such we cannot but realize 
that the trumpet gives an uncertain sound. A military man must have 
the knowledge that it was his officer who gave the command. That is 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 11 

the power behind the command. The world is full of people with 
opinions, but it wants men of conviction. The greatest need of our life 
is the conviction of the love of God. This command we hear from God 
himself and we should obey it certainly and enthusiastically. God is 
filled with unfathomable mystery; every thing that God has touched par- 
takes of this mystery. There cannot be those principles which have 
made our country great and have kept it great without the belief in the 
principles of God. If you are going to study Christianity, take years 
to do it, and go deeply into it and you will come back to where you 
started. Whether it is behind the gun, or behind the sword, the man is 
the power. 

Have respect for your faith, for yourselves, for your manhood. Be 
men of faith, men of action, men of enthusiasm. Enthusiasts are men 
who have let God take possession of them. Persevere, do not quit, fight 
life's battles like men. The world needs manhood today. Put your 
heart's blood into your work. Be men of enthusiasm, not spasmodic. 
You are going out into the world to be tried, and temptations will 
overtake you, but, a defeated soldier is not necessarily a disloyal soldier. 
Go at it again. The colors stand for principles, and men try to keep 
themselves clean to be worthy of the colors. God can bring beautiful 
music out of our lives, if we are willing the Master Musician should 
play upon His own instrument. 

I beg of you to receive your diplomas not as a reward for some dis- 
tinction or past effort, but as a commission for active service. Keceive 
them as men of God, ready to live up to the high standard of right 
living, ready to battle in the grandest and noblest of struggles, and 
may God give you strength and courage for the warfare here and the 
victory hereafter. 

SEEMON BEFOEE THE COLLEGE Y. M. C. A. 
By Eev. J. Morgan Eead, D. D. 

In the evening at 8 o'clock a large congregation gathered in the 
Second Methodist Episcopal Church for the College Service under the 
auspices of the College Young Men's Christian Association. 

The sermon on the occasion was by the Eev. J. Morgan Eead, D. D,, 
President of Pennington Seminary. He made a few prefatory remarks 
prior to his sermon, in which he said he had always felt proud of St. 
John's, where he had been a student, and that he was one of the three 
men called upon by Dr. Hopkins, the then President, to found the 
College Y. M. C. A. He took for his text. Acts xiii, BQ: " For David, 
after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep 
and was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption. ' ' 

Dr. Eead said in part: 

Life is more serious than death. Death, which comes at the end of 
a well spent life, is only entering the harbor, while life is a struggle 
against the waves and billows. It is not the man who is taking down 
the sails, but the man who is setting sails that needs to think and 
consider. 



12 St. John's College Commencement and 

Life is more than a playground, it is a mission, in whicli every one 
must take a part. It is a chain in which each one is a link. It is the 
little things that count in life. The physician who does not respond to 
night calls because he knows there is not a dollar in it, will never rise 
to the top of his profession; the student who does not care to study, 
and is satisfied just to pull through college, will never be given the presi- 
dency of a college. The world wants men who serve well. A man's 
life is measured by what he does, not by his gifts, but by the exercise of 
his gifts. It is not the bright boy, but the student, the boy who works 
while other boys play, the boy who keeps everlastingly at it, that forges 
ahead. 

But, do not be contented to serve your generation without serving 
God. A man's life cannot be a failure if he serves God, and the men 
who have succeeded are the men who have linked God with their lives. 
It should be the great purpose of each life so to serve its generation 
that at the end God may say ' ' Come up higher. ' ' 

MONDAY, JUNE 14 

10.00 A. M. — Senior Oeatorical Contest. 

A large number of friends assembled to listen to this contest, and gave 
closest attention to the orations which were as follows: 

1. "A Unique Achievement " 

J. Alexander Kendrick, Eipley, Md. 

2. ^' The Eetention of the Philippines " 

E. Elmer Jones, Lynch 's, Md. 

3. ' ' The Better Way ' ' 

William B. Ennis, Annapolis, Md. 

The Judges were Messrs. E. P. Melvin, H. J. Fenton and H. E. Eiley, 
and they unanimously awarded the prize of $25.00 (offered annually 
by the Alumni Association) to Mr. William B. Ennis, of Annapolis. 

This contest was followed by a Literary Address by Professor Hiram 
Corson, Professor Emeritus of English Literature at Cornell University, 
and formerly Professor of English at St. John's College. 

12.00 M.— Drill by Cadet Corps. 

3.00 P. M. — Baseball Game, College versus Alumni. 

6.00 P. M.— Dress Parade. 

8.00 P. M.— Farewell Ball, Class 1910 to Class 1909. President Fell 
and Mrs. Fell acted as hosts, representing the Class. The gathering 
was one of unusual brilliance, and was much enjoyed by those taking 
part in it. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 13 



TUESDAY, JUNE 15 

10.30 A. M. — Class Day Exercises. 

(Music by College Orchestra.) 
Procession of Class to Stage. 
Calling of Meeting to Order by the President. 
Calling of Eoll by Secretary. 
Eeading of Minutes of Preceding Meeting. 
Class Business. 

Salutatory C. L. Weaver. 

Unveiling of Class Shield. 

Class History J. A. Kendrick. 

Presentations C. T. Johnson. 

Class Prophecy R. E. Jones. 

Presentations of Mock Diplomas. 

Class Will W. B. Ennis. 

Valedictory. 

Auld Lang Syne. 

(Sung by Class.) 

Should auld acquaintance be forgot 

And never brought to mind? 
Should auld acquaintance be forgot 
And days of Auld Lang Syne? 
Chorus. 

And here's a hand my trusty frien' 

And gie's a hand of thine: 
We'll take a cup of kindness yet 

For Auld Lang Syne. 

Chorus. 

i^Jitrattmi 

^tvtx (SgmttaHium nnh ^istax^mi iM^tting 
(Hammvmttrntixit of tijp AtttttttprBarg 

At 3.00 P. M., there was a large gathering for the Dedication of the 
New Gymnasium, and a Historical Meeting, commemorative of the 
Anniversary. The procession of Delegates and Representatives formed 
at the College Library and marched in a body to the Gymnasium, where 
the following addresses were delivered: 



14 St. John's College Commencement and 

HISTOEY OF THE COLLEGE 
By George Forbes, Class 1892. 
The Secretary of State, Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

It is my privilege this afternoon, to conduct you along the avenues 
of the past, so far back as the beginning of the parent school of old 
St. John's, to the latter part of the seventeenth century; to be specific, 
to the year 1696. Some months ago it gave me pleasure to deliver an 
illustrated lecture before my fellow Annapolitans under the auspices of 
this College, on " Annapolis in Colonial and Eevolutionary Days," and 
as I consumed some two and a half hours on that occasion, to which 
Dr. Fell was witness, I fear he concluded that, in one respect at least, 
I resembled the railroads which enter Chicago, viz: that I lacked 
terminal facilities; for on this occasion he has had your interest enough 
at heart to inform me that the two hundred and thirteen years of which 
I am to speak must be covered in twenty minutes. 

As a tree is known by its fruit, so an institution of learning is known 
by the men it produces, and the buildings which it erects and equips. 
The former are necessarily more transitory monuments, while the latter 
may remain almost indefinitely as material evidence of the wisdom of 
its rulers. To these more enduring monuments now let us turn. 

Eef erring to Bacon's Laws of Maryland, I find that the earlier insti- 
tution was indexed under the undignified appellation of '' K. William's 
School." While we cannot approve of this unique abbreviation we see 
further evidence of this ancient custom within the borders of the city, 
for on the corner stone of the Naval Academy, now set into the Academic 
Building, we read: '' Pounded during the administration of James K. 
Polk, President of the U. States." King William's School has, how- 
ever, other reasons than the one just recited for being unique, for it was 
the first public school on the American continent, was under the pat- 
ronage of the King, and the Primate and Metropolitan of all England, 
the Archbishop of Canterbury was its Chancellor. 

True that Harvard, founded in 1636, was the first school; that Wil- 
liam & Mary at Williamsburg, Va., founded in 1693, was the second; 
and that King William's, founded in 1696, was the third; nevertheless. 
King William's was the first free public school. 

The Act of 1696, Chapter 17, fathered by Governor Nicholson, which 
gave life to this institution, was, surprising as it may seem from its 
early date, a most comprehensive plan for a free school system through- 
out the State of Maryland, contemplating as it did the ultimate estab- 
lishment of a free school in each of the counties of the State, btu making 
provision at the time for only one — the ' ' Free School at Severn, ' ' which 
the Act specially provided should be named after William III, the then 
reigning sovereign of England, and be known as '^ King William's 
School." 

I have said that Harvard, founded in 1636, was the first school, but 
I am informed by President Tyler, of the College of William and Mary, 
that there was a College started in Virginia as early as 1619, but burned 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 15 

by the Indians, which facts I have been unable further to verify, but 
hope eventually to do so, for verification would prove that the first insti- 
tution of learning of any kind in America was in our sister State of 
Virginia, a fact naturally gratifying to all Southerners. 

In the limited time at my command, it will be possible to do little 
more than briefly sketch the turning points in the history of King Wil- 
liam 's School and St. John's College, its successor by legislative act. 

Governor Nicholson is the man to whom Annapolis is primarily in- 
debted for its beginnings as a conspicuous colonial community. It was 
he who laid out the city, started the first State House, the first church 
(St. Anne's) and the free school. He gave the land on which the school 
stood (the site being now approximately marked by the DeKalb Statue 
on State House Hill), and made other donations toward the school's 
support. Annapolis became the Capital in 1694 when he was governor, 
and although he filled the office but four years, his accomplishments 
were numerous. The first session of the State Legislature at Annapolis, 
over which he presided, passed an Act for the advancement of learning; 
which, however, is not extant. 

Eeference to the Act of 1715, chapter 4, discloses interesting facts, to 
my knowledge, not heretofore referred to. From this Act it appears 
that Governor Nicholson conveyed to the free school ^' certain lots of 
land in the city of Annapolis, and an house thereon erected, commonly 
called the ' Kentish House,' which lot is stated to be ' one of three 
lots of land in the said town, lying to the southwest of the said lots. ' ' ' 
With this information and Stoddert's map as a guide, and noting that 
Francis Street (evidently named for Governor Francis Nicholson by 
reason of the location of his lands thereon) lies at the foot of the 
Stadt-House Hill, and runs from that point to its intersecting point with 
Church Street, we can readily locate the house referred to. On Stod- 
dert's map of Annapolis of 1718, that being three years after this Act 
of Assembly, a strip of land on the east side of Francis Street, from 
the Circle to Main Street, is marked '' Free School land." The inter- 
vening land between it and East Street is marked " Ground formerly 
surveyed for Governor Nicholson, claimed and in possession of Mr. 
Bordley. ' ' Assuming, therefore, that in 1694 Governor Nicholson owned 
(as from the statute it appears he did, certainly prior to 1715) the 
entire tract between the Circle, East Street and Francis Street, down 
so far as the intersecting line with Church Street, the '' southwest side 
of the said three lots " would indicate that the property now occupied 
by Dr. J. Eoland Walton was a part thereof. The Act of 1715 also 
states that Governor Nicholson gave the sum of ten pounds sterling for 
and towards a house to be built thereon, and that he prevailed with a 
certain Anthony, alias William Workman, formerly of Kent Island, but 
then of Annapolis, Inn-holder, to give 150 lbs. sterling more towards 
the building of the said house on the aforesaid lot, and that he, together 
with Workman and a certain William Freeman, of Philadelphia, a brick- 
layer, contracted for the building of the said house, which was to be 



16 St. John's College Commencement and 

held and occupied by the said Workman during his natural life, and 
afterwards to remain over to the use of the free schools. The Act 
further states that the said house luas erected on the lot aforesaid, and 
that Anthony Workman, in consideration of the money he advanced was, 
by " Ordinance of the General Assembly," given leave, to keep an 
Ordinary in said house during his natural life, without the usual fine 
imposed by law therefor. Now as the " Kentish House " was to be 
built of brick, and the home of Dr. Walton is of brick, and has always 
been thought to be a colonial inn, and as its construction would indicate 
such an occupancy; and further as it is the only colonial house on the 
lots described, other than one reputed to have been occupied by Governor 
Nicholson, which was of frame, every indication would point to the 
fact that the present residence of Dr. Walton was the ' ' Kentish House ' ' 
of colonial days. 

The Act also makes it clear that this was the property of the free 
schools in Annapolis. This enabling Act was occasioned by the loss of 
the deeds prior to their being recorded, which loss in the course of 
years, has i^roved most fortunate, as it enables us to definitely trace the 
interesting history of this old tavern. Its date, too, is most accurately 
fixed, as Governor Nicholson resided in Annapolis and was Governor of 
the State from July, 1694, until Governor Blakistone was commissioned 
in October, 1698, and as he gave the land in 1696, and recalling his 
energy in promoting other buildings, it is more than probable that this 
building was completed before he left in 1698, thereby making it one 
of the oldest house of authentic history in the city of Annapolis, and 
placing it in chronological order with the old Treasury Building or 
Council House, the Dorsey House and the Sands House. 

The free school building was started about 1696, but it does not ap- 
pear to have been ready for use until 1701. The declared purpose of 
the school was to educate the youth of the colony in good letters, and 
manners, and to provide '* a perpetual succession of Protestant Divines 
of the Church of England for the propogation of the true Christian 
religion in the said colonies." It will be seen, therefore, that at this 
time, being under the patronage of a Protestant King, with the Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury as its chancellor, and in an English colony, in 
which the Protestants were in power, that the Church of England exer- 
cised a controlling influence over the school. The further influence of 
the Church is shown in its requirements that the school masters were 
required to be members of the Church of England, and of " pure and 
exemplary lives and conversation, ' ' and ' ' capable of teaching well, 
grammar, good writing and mathematics," but that they did not always 
live up to this standard is shown by a quotation from a letter of 
Governor Nicholson to the Board of Trade, in which he says: " There is 
often very great want, and now especially, of good clergymen and 
school masters for these i:>arts of the world; and I will not venture to 
answer for some of their abilities, lives and conversations." 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 17 

In passing it will be interesting to note tliat the funds for tlie school 
were raised in part by a poll tax, a tax on tobacco, and a tax on negroes 
imported into the Province, This scheme of taxation for the school 
suj)port was followed in the charter of St. John 's College, where taxes 
on almost every conceivable thing, including a tax on marriage licenses, 
were levied for the school's maintenance. In view of the recent ruling 
of the Secretary of the Navy that midshipmen must not marry for two 
years after leaving the Academy, may we not now inquire if this was 
the ancient method of preventing graduates of St. John 's from too early 
succumbing to the wiles of Cupid. 

King William's School was a grammar school, designed as the 
Governor stated, '■'■ to prepare both English and Indian boys for his 
Majesty's Eoyal College of William and Mary in Virginia." 

Facts heretofore unknown to me, and I believe not of common knowl- 
edge, are that when the State House was burned in 1704, the Provincial 
and county records were lodged in the free school, and the Commissary 
Eecords on the back porch thereof, which was ' ' to be made tight and 
shelves put up there for the books, "and that the Provincial and County 
Courts sat in the school building for a time, as also the Council, prior 
to the fire, apparently before it was quite finished, or at least before it 
was occupied for a school. 

From the breaking out of the War of Independence, the official con- 
nection between the Church and the school ceased, and it will ever be 
to the credit of Episcopalians, who were then in control of the State 
Government that, of their own volitlori, they repealed their own Legis- 
lative Act of 1692, which m.ade the Church of England the established 
Church in England, and thus put on record their disapproval of the 
union of Church and State, as contrary to the j)rinciples of republican 
government. Shortly after this (in 1784) the same Legislature chartered 
St. John's College, and provided that it should have no religious test, 
and was to be officered by men to be chosen irrespective of their re- 
ligious professions or beliefs. In confirmation of this action, they ap- 
pointed Eev. Dr. Smith, then Bishop-elect of Maryland, an Episcopalian; 
Archbishop Carroll, of Baltimore, a Eoman Catholic, and the Eev. Dr. 
Patrick Allison, a leading Presbyterian Divine of the State, with cer- 
tain laymen of each faith, as soliciting agents for subscriptions to the 
College, as also for Washington College at Chestertown, which, with 
St. John's, the Act contemplated was to form the University of Mary- 
land. The formal opening of St. John's took place in 1789 with great 
pomp and ceremony. 

And now to a more practical question, the all absorbing quesiton in 
America today — the question of dollars and cents. It wall doubtless 
astound my auditors to hear that, morally, and we think legally, though 
it is now too late to adjudicate that question, the State of Maryland 
owes St. John 's College over five millions of dollars, and this makes 
■allowance for all credits on the original claim; but of course the interest 
as compounded; at simple interest, however, the claim is over two and a 



18 St. John's College Commencement and 

quarter millions of dollars. Those of you unfamiliar with our claim 
will doubtless be surprised at this statement, which my limited time does, 
not permit me to present in detail, but the proof of it can readily be 
found in legislative Acts in the College literature and in logarithm 
tables. I may say, however, at the outset, the Legislature granted 
$8,750 a year, with a view of providing ' ' a permanent fund ' ' which 
was pledged ' ' annually and forever hereafter as a donation by th& 
public to the use of the College." In 1806 this so-called " permanent 
fund " was withdrawn, and the College had to suspend, though never 
relinquishing its charter rights. From time to time, through the course 
of years, until the present, small sums ha^e been given by the Legislature,, 
other sums have been raised by private and public subscriptions, and 
thus the College has spasmodically been enabled to exist. In 1859, when 
the Board obtained permission to submit its claim of a violation of 
the charter provisions to the Court of Appeals of Maryland, the Court 
decided every point in favor of the College. There was a release, how- 
ever, given by the Board to the State in 1833, in consideration of tha 
State's paying a small sum over to the College, and this release stand- 
ing in the way, the question of its binding force was submitted to lead- 
ing jurists for their opinion, who thought that the Board's act was ultra 
vires, and steps were taken to carry the case to the Supreme Court of 
the United States. The Maryland Legislature then restored certain 
arrearages and voted a small sum in addition, which the College Visitors^ 
taking as a recognition of their rights, on the part of the Legislature, 
accepted, and relinquished the suit. Subsequently the Legislature with- 
drew its appropriation, and as the right of appeal had then expired by 
limitation, the College has been materially handicapped ever since. It 
should be said at this point that the appropriations of the Legislature 
since then, have been so small and spasmodically made that no certain 
salary could be expected by its professors, and as a consequence it be- 
came an undesirable institution with Vv^hich to be connected. In view of 
these facts, its career has been a checkered one, and manifestly the re- 
sponsibility is primarily that of the State of Maryland, which withdrew 
its paternal support when its child was yet in swaddling clothes, being 
then but seventeen years of age. 

The Governor is of course the Chief Executive of the State, and as 
such its right hand. I regret that the Governor of Maryland is not here 
today to learn of his gubernatorial great-grandfather's treatment of the 
child that great-grandfather begot. I am pleased to note, however, that 
his accomplished Secretary of State is with us (for he is a conspicuous 
and distinguished branch of the State's family tree), so that he may 
convey to his Excellency the call of this child for succor, its plea for 
justice, which it has an especial reason now to claim and expect at the 
hands of a Governor who has so recently doffed the ermine— to the end 
that McDowell Hall may thus be enabled to rise from its ashes. 

As before observed, St. John's for years had a most precarious 
existence, and until the installation of our present President, Dr. Fell,, 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 19 

at whose coming in 1886, there were but sixty students in attendance, 
and the buildings were in a somewhat dilapidated condition. In two 
years he doubled the number of students, renovated the halls, and 
equipped them vv'ith every modern convenience, including steam heat, 
hot and cold water, and an abundance of bath-rooms, with every other 
appliance for comfort and culture. 

My subject dealing with the past, and the line of demarkation between 
the past and the present being indeterminate, I take it I am privileged 
to refer to the College as many of us would view it in the present, but 
which technically is of the past. We note with gratification that in very 
recent years, under the same admirable administration, its progress has 
been especially rapid, however financially handicapped, having added 
Woodward, and Senior Hall, and a gymnasium to its group of buildings, 
the latter the building we now occupy, and which our powers of observa- 
tion enable us to see is one of the most complete and satisfactory 
:structures of its kind, artistically and practically, which the country 
affords, and a worthy monument to the energy and skill of its promoters 
and designers. The military bearing of the corps of cadets would do 
credit to West Point, and does credit to St. John's military instructor, 
Lieutenant Iglehart. Indeed, the whole conduct and management of the 
College today is deserving of the greatest praise to Dr. Fell and the 
other earnest, zealous and capable members of the faculty. 

Of the earlier fruit of this tree we are shortly to be told by Mr. De- 
vecmon, and of its promise for the future by Mr. Noble, both sons of 
St. John's, and distinguished at the Bar, one in Maryland and the other 
in New York. But before I leave my subject, a word or two as to the 
history of the one venerable building on the College campus, so recently 
■destroyed, in part, by fire. 

In 1744 McDowell Hall was projected by Governor Thomas Bladen, 
as a noble mansion for the residence of the Governor of Maryland. 
Materials were provided, and workmen busy; indeed, the edifice almost 
completed in a style of superior elegance, when a disagreement between 
the Governor and the Legislature caused the work to stop and remain for 
a long time a melancholy and mouldering monument of the consequences 
of political dissension. By reason of this disagreement, it received the 
<iognomen of ' ' The Governor 's Folly. ' ' Thanks to the action of our 
Governors, in directing a resolution, we can say to our visitors today, 
that the derisive designation of " The Governor's Folly " is no longer 
applicable. 

It was a building of so much importance that Mr. Duff, a Scotch 
architect, came from abroad to superintend its construction. Para- 
phrasing a line of his fellow countryman, in the broad sense, and 
desirous of replacing each old brick, may we not now say in friendly 
spirit, to those who would have thrown a pearl away richer than all 
our tribe: 
*' Lay on Macduff, and damned be him that first cries. Hold, enough! " 



20 St. John's College Commencement and 

Mr. Eidgley, referring to the abandoned McDowell Hall, in Ms Annals 
of Annapolis, sajs: " The depredations of time have greatly injured 
the interior of the building; which in an unfinished state continued for 
many years exposed to the inclemency of the weather. But the Legis- 
lature, actuated by sentiments which reflect tlie highest credit on their 
patriotism and wisdom, resolved to repair the damages sustained and to. 
apply the building to the purposes of education; a precedent many of 
us were gratified to note, our Board considered w^orthy of emulation. 
McDowell Hall, most of us know, is a four-story structure, including the 
basement, but how many of us have observed, that it is the only colonial 
house remaining in Annapolis with quoined corners, and a moat effect 
about it. ' ' 

What a splendid history it has had! Note these epoch-making events:- 

1. Started about 1745 as a residence for- Maryland's Colonial 
Governors. 

2. Completed in 1789 as St. John 's College, and in that year formally 
opened in the Chapel Eoom in the presence of the members of the 
General Assembly, the Chancellor, the Judges of the General Court, 
city officials, leading citizens of Annapolis, students and faculty, with 
the Governors and Visitors of the old King William's School and the 
new St. John's College. There were also present on this occasion, the- 
Protestant Episcopal Bishop-elect of Maryland; Archbishop Carroll, of 
Baltimore, a Eoman Catholic; Dr. Patrick Allison, a leading Presbyterian 
divine of the State; Bishop Claggett, of Maryland, the rector of St.. 
Anne's, and many other distinguished visitors. 

3. In 1791, General Washington, as President of the United States,. 
visited the College and Avas entertained in this Hall, as indeed he had" 
been prior to that time. 

4. In 1824, General Lafayette was entertained in the Hall on the 
occasion of his visit to America, and the day after, it is recorded, there- 
was a review of the military of the United States from Fort Severn,. 
and the Maryland volunteers on the College campus; and afterwards a 
contest in rifle shooting, the prize being presented by General Lafayette 
to the company of Captain Louis Neth, who now, by the way, lies 
beneath the sod at * * Primrose Hill, ' ' in our suburbs, and on his tomb- 
stone is cut this pathetic ei>itaph : ' ' Louis Neth — the last of his name. ' ' 
It makes one shiver to think how near we came to writing the epitaph, 
' ' McDowell Hall— tlie last of old St. John 's. ' ' 

5. Again, in the same Hall, General Lafayette was entertained by 
the Maryland Legislature, the previous banquet having been given by 
the citizens. 

6. Used as a ball-room often in Colonial Days, and it has therefore 
been graced by the wit and beauty of a period when Annapolis was^ 
famed the Avorld over for the beauty of its women. It seems almost 
superfluous for me to add that Annapolis has always maintained its- 
reputation in this regard. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 21 

7. From 1861 to 1865 it was occupied by the United States au- 
thorities as a military hospital. 

8. And lastly, from 1789, and the days of Francis Scott Key, to 
1909, it has witnessed the graduation of every class which has gone 
forth from this College, and this Chapel Room still stands in great part, 
as if edifying the hand of calamity. 

How applicable today, are the lines of the poem written by the rector 
of St. Anne's in 1771, and addressed to the inhabitants of Annapolis, 
in what proved to be a successful plea, for his church: 
' ' With grief in yonder field hard by 
A sister-ruin I espy; 
Old Bladen's Palace, once so famed, 
And now too well ' the folly ' named. 
Her roof all tottering to decay. 
Her walls a-mouldering all away; 



Though now forever gone and lost, 
I blush to say how little cost. 
The handsome pile would have preserved 
Till some new prefect had deserved." 
These last four lines indicate that the roofless building, to which 
similar state it has now been reduced by fire, was thought to have been 
* ' forever gone and lost. ' ' When it is considered that it stood, without 
cover, subject to the fury of the elements for nearly half a century, and 
that despite the fury of the recent flames, six- or seven-eighths of its 
walls have refused in each instance, to succumb, we agree with the 
Visitors and Governors of the College that its noble defense against 
the fire and the storm entitles it to preservation, and we sincerely hope 
that its architectural character will be preserved without addition or 
alteration, to the exterior and the Chapel in any event. Had the 
Board's action in determining to restore been contrary we, too, might 
have 

'' . i . Blushed to say how little cost 
The handsome pile would have preserved 
Till some new prefect had deserved." 
The poem 's applicability continues, when we read : 
" The premises considered I 
With humble confidence rely, 
Till phoenix-like I soon shall rise 
From my own ashes to the skies. ' ' 
By way of finale, it may not be amiss to quote the language of our 
immortal Key, in appealing to the Legislature in behalf of St. John's, 
when in reference to McDowell Hall, he said: 

" Thirty years ago I stood within that Hall, with the companions and 
the guides of my youth, and bade farewell to them, to our reverend 
instructors, and received the parting benediction of that beloved and 



22 St. John's College Commencement and 

venerated man, who ruled the institution he had reared and adorned, 
not more by the force of authority than of affection. In a few short 
years I returned, and the companions and guides of my youth were 
gone. The glory of the Temple of Science, which the wisdom and the 
piety of our fathers had founded was departed. I beheld in its place 
a dreary ruin. I wandered over that beautiful and silent green, no 
longer sacred to the meditations of the enraptured student, or vocal 
with the joyous shouts of youthful merriment, I sat down on those 
mouldering steps and beneath the shadow of that aged tree that like 
me seemed to lament its lost companions, and I mourned over the mad- 
ness that had wrought this desolation." 

But thanks to those who have combined their love for the historic 
with a keen appreciation of what McDowell Hall has meant to the 
College in the past and will mean in the future, we can now convert 
the mourning of the author of our National Anthem into paeans of 
joy and of praise. Verily 

'' There is given 
Unto the things of earth which time hath bent, 
A spirit 's feeling ; and where he hath lent 
His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power 
And magic in the ruined battlement; 
For which the palace of the present hour 
Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages are its dower. ' ' 



THE ALUMNI OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE. 
By William C. Devecmon, Class 1881. 
My Fellow Alumni, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

It is a time-worn saying that man is naturally a religious animal. 
Of all the multitudinous forms of religion that have in different ages 
obtained among the various races of men, one of the most universal has 
been that of ancestor worship. The injunction to honor thy father and 
thy mother, and thy father's father and mother's mother to the re- 
motest generation, has, independent of the divine sanction, always been 
recognized as a duty among the races of mankind; and, where men 
have not made gods of the progenitors of their family or race, they 
have deified the founders of ethical cults. Such has been the origin of 
nearly all religions. To honor their spiritual as well as their physical 
forebears may properly, in the light of history, be considered as a duty 
resting upon all mankind. Happy that family, happy that race, happy 
that religious or ethical cult whose progenitors were such as to merit 
the love and veneration of succeeding generations! 

We are assembled here to render our tribute of homage to this vener- 
able mother, this first great progenitor of education in the State of 
Maryland, and to her illustrious offspring who have gone before us. 
In point of time I believe there were two colleges established on this 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 23 

continent before St. John's, but by their charters, or by the terms and 
limitations of their foundation, the scope of their usefulness was limited 
either by religious or financial or other restrictions. On the other hand, 
education at King William's School, which was the old name for St. 
John 's College, was free — free from religious restrictions, free from 
financial obligations, the first free public school upon the western 
hemisphere. It can with justice claim to be the mother of the public 
free school system of all the States of this Union. All hail to this 
venerable institution! All hail to its illustrious founders! All hail to 
the brilliant sons of St. John's who have proven not unworthy of their 
glorious ancestry! 

Upon its reorganization under the name of St. John's College, the 
first class was graduated in 1793; and, during the thirteen years that 
elapsed until 1806, when, on account of the withdrawal of the Legis- 
lative appropriation, the functions of the College were suspended, a 
historian of the College has stated that among the sons of St. John's 
were '* four Governors of Maryland, one United States Senator, five 
members of the House of Representatives, four Judges of the Courts, 
one Attorney- General, one United States District Attorney, six State 
Senators, fifteen Representatives, besides oflEicers of the Army and Navy, 
leading lawyers, divines, and men of note in other walks of life. ' ' The 
lack of an endowment or other permanent source of sure income has 
always been the only limitation upon St. John's scope of influence; but 
within the boundaries which were apparently fixed by her founders she 
has worthily fulfilled their fondest expectations. It was declared that 
King William 's School was founded ' ' for the propogation of the 
Gospel and the education of the youth of the Province in good letters 
and manners. ' ' At least this is the language of the Act of 1696, a 
re-enactment of the Act of 1694, which I believe is no longer extant; 
and in the charter of St. John's College, granted in 1784, that institu- 
tion is said to be established * ' for the liberal education of youth in 
the principles of virtue, knowledge, and useful literature." At that 
time a liberal education was not supposed to occupy itself with the 
material aspects of life; its aim was to give the student culture rather 
than knowledge, to train him to be a gentleman rather than a man of 
affairs. During the present generation this view has changed, and the 
chief aim of the college education today is supposed to be to endow 
the student with that mental equipment which will best qualify him for 
a struggle m life to amass property and wealth. Then, the refinements 
of polite intercourse were more highly thought of; today, the master 
minds of the world are occupied with stupendous problems of produc- 
tion and transportation. It is but natural that systems of education 
should change to conform with current ideas of usefulness to society. 
St. John's College, on account of the lack of money, has always been 
ill equipped to compete with the great colleges of the North in giving 
her students a thorough knowledge of chemistry, electricity, and 
mechanics. Titanic weapons in the hands of man today with which he 



24 St. John's College Commencement and 

moves or tunnels mountains, spans oceans and continents, conquers the 
air, and annihilates space. But after all, the greatest among the modern 
captains of commerce, production, transportation, and invention have 
not received their education in the colleges, and I am inclined to think 
that a preliminary training in culture and morals would not have de- 
tracted from their chances of success in their warfare to subdue the 
elements and agencies of nature; and, though it may be admitted that 
it is highly advantageous in this material age for the young man to 
have a commercial or scientific education, it is certainly of equal impor- 
tance that he should have proper training in morals and general culture, 
and this training St. John's College is at least as well equipped to 
give as the largest and most wealthy institutions of learning. It is in 
youth that our characters are formed. Character is something that is 
carved or cut into us, fixed indestructibly as part of ourselves. It must, 
I think, be admitted that the greatest desideratum in the education of 
youth is to give him a high moral tone — character, cut deep into the 
very bone so that the floods and tempests of life can leave but little 
impression upon the graven lines. The students of this old institution 
have come from all walks of life; but when they pass out from these 
halls they have one feature in common — the alumnus of St. John's is in 
character a gentleman. 

No man today would face a body of college graduates, or even under- 
graduates, and affirm the old saw that man is the architect of his own 
fortune. The greenest sophomore knows the absurdity of the dictum 
of Buckle that a Shakespeare or a Newton could be born among the 
Hottentots of Africa as well as in civilized England, and that intel- 
lectual ability is a m.atter of education and environment. It is now 
known that brain capacity is a matter of inheritance; and that moral 
tendencies are also inherited, but by no means to the same extent as 
the intellectual. The moral atmosphere in which a boy is reared is 
assimilated and becomes part of himself. The air within these vener- 
able walls is saturated with the moral tone, and I may add with the 
culture, of nearly all the noble Marylanders who have made fame in 
this State or beyond its borders. In this lies the historic grandeur of 
St. John's College, and in this abides an ever potent influence for good 
among her students. The shades of Maryland's heroic dead still stalk 
about this campus and through these halls. The Lares and Penates of 
St. John's College are a continual admonition to laborious effort, to 
virtue and integrity in thought and deed. 

To write a paper upon the Alumni of St. John 's College, and do 
justice to the subject, would be tantamount to preparing biographies 
of most of the distinguished men of Maryland — indeed, almost to write 
a history of the State. Were I competent for such an undertaking this 
is hardly the occasion for its presentation. 

While we claim that Maryland built the first steamboat, the first 
railway, and the first telegraph line in this country, it must be ad- 
mitted that in science, and in the amassing of great fortunes our State 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 25 

cannot claim any special distinction among her sister States. But in 
statesmanship, in the formation of this government, and in its political 
development, her influence has been second to none; while in the number 
of the pre-eminently great lawyers she has produced, Maryland is with- 
out a peer; and to enumerate them would be almost like calling the 
roll of the Alumni of St. John's College. Among them two stand out 
in bold prominence in the history of the State and the Nation. 

Of all the names connected with the College that of William Pinkney 
must unquestionably be regarded the greatest. Originally destined for 
the medical profession, he soon perceived that a profession, the knowl- 
edge in regard to which was at that time so crude that the most skilled 
practitioners could be regarded as little better than quacks, was not 
suited to his genius nor to the genius of his times. In Pinkney 's age 
the Zeitgeist was the development of the science of government and 
its twin brother, the law. Pinkney became a statesman and a lawyer. 
The branches of the profession then of chief importance were real 
estate and special pleading. He acquired an accurate and profound 
knowledge of them both. In the practice of the profession, eloquence 
then had an importance which we in this age of dry fact can with difBi- 
culty estimate or realize. William Pinkney cultivated eloquence, and 
became the most eloquent man of his own or perhaps of any age. Some 
years ago a certain European Prince was distinguished by being called 
*' the first gentleman of Europe." Pinkney 's age was distinguished 
for its social culture; it was pre-eminently the age of gentlemen in 
America, and he was pre-eminently the gentleman of his age. Con- 
temporary with Luther Martin and Daniel Webster, William Pinkney 
was at least their equal in legal knowledge, and very much their superior 
as an orator. In the War of 1812 he was an officer in the American 
Army. Always throughout his life he was one of the most laborious 
of men. 

A genius, a supremely great man, is the embodiment of the spirit of 
the times in which he lives. Such was Pericles, such was Shakespeare, 
such was Napoleon, and such was Pinkney. Would you understand the 
real spirit of the times in any period of the world's history? Study 
the biography, and the acts and works of that period's great man. A 
new word has recently found its way into the English language, though 
I believe not yet in the dictionaries — the word ^' superman." In 
nearly every jDeriod of the world's history you will find certain super- 
men whose lives comprise the life of their nation, and sometimes of the 
world, while they lived. Though as a soldier Pinkney never won a 
great battle or planned a great campaign; though as a statesman he 
did nothing to permanently shape his country's destiny; though as a 
lawyer no great principle of the law owes its origin to him: yet, take 
him all in all, he had no contemporary who better represented the 
character of the times. It has been said of Shakespeare that he was 
the soul of his age. I say of William Pinkney he was the embodiment 
of the spirit of his times. 



26 St. John's College Commencement and 

St. John's has another son who has almost equal claim to be classed 
among the supermen, the supremely great men of the world. The result 
of the American War of Independence was not merely the creation of 
a new government, and a new form of government on this western 
hemisphere. It was indeed a revolution, a complete overturning of all 
preexisting ideas of government. It was the beginning of an evolution 
which will doubtless affect the destinies of nations for ages to come. 
An authoritative declaration of the rights of man, a written enumera- 
tion of the fundamental rights of the citizen and of the government 
were its chief products; and they gave birth to new thoughts, new 
feelings and new aspirations among mankind. France especially was 
enthusiastic, and the new ideas spread throughout the world. In the 
War of 1812, the life of the new order of things was felt to be at stake. 
Was ' ' time 's latest offspring ' ' to perish 1 Had a painter or a sculptor 
given the world a true representation of the spirit and thought of that 
age, he would be entitled to rank among the world's supermen. A 
poet may give a name and local habitation to airy nothing, but only a 
superpoet, one of transcendent genius, could in a few short verses give 
body, form and substance to the dream, the impalpable spirit, of a 
whole generation of mankind. Oh, Francis Scott Key, long will your 
name and fame wave over the land of the free and the home of the 
brave ! 

William Pinkney and Francis Scott Key, what a combination, and 
what a contrast! Would that a Plutarch could parallel and contrast 
their lives! Pinkney 's life itself is an immortal portrait of his age; 
Key portrayed it in immortal verse. 

Key's chief claim to greatness, striking as it does the chord of 
patriotic sentiment, is at this day thoroughly appreciated. A Key 
society has been formed to preserve the memorials of his life, and 
monuments have been erected in his honor, even in far California. 
There is an element of the spectacular in that heroic song. The Star 
Spangled Banner, and especially in the circumstances under which it 
was composed; it appeals to the popular imagination, to man's love of 
the dramatically heroic. The less spectacular, but more solid claim of 
Pinkney to supreme greatness will be slower of popular recognition. 
But some day there will arise a sociologist who will at once be a scien- 
tist and a philosopher. He will analyze all the elements of human 
greatness, and formulate a science of systematic knowledge on the 
subject. Upon that foundation he will construct a philosophy, and 
illustrate it by the lives of the world's great men. In that galaxy of 
the world's deified dead William Pinkney will shine as a star of the 
first magnitude. 

Had St. John 's College produced only a Pinkney and a Key, in giving 
these two great sons to the State and the Nation she has justified her 
existence; but as a matter of fact throughout the entire life of the 
Colony and State of Maryland, the brain and brawn of the alumni of 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fibth Anniversary 27 

St. John's have done much to shape the destinies of the Commonwealth 
and weave her wreaths of glory. 

Oh Maryland, when you forget the services of St. John's College, thy 
ingratitude must be sharper than the bite of the adder 's tooth. Through- 
out all your history, the brain that has thought for you, the tongue that 
has talked for you, and the hand that has wrought for you were trained 
within these walls! 

AIM AND OUTLOOK FOE THE FUTUEE 
By Herbert Noble, Class 1889. 

My Fellow Alumni, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

It does not seem twenty years since I ceased to be a student in this 
old College, and I suppose the feeling which I have today — that we 
should be at home in our old rooms again, unmindful, for the moment, 
of the places we have made for ourselves in the world of endeavor 
and work since we left here — is shared by all of us who have come back. 
The intrigues of class politics, the politics of the secret societies, the 
keennees of the football and other athletic contests, the glee club con- 
certs, the serenades, and the occasional quiet games of poker at a penny 
ante and five-cent limit, are so fresh in one's memory that one feels 
almost as though one could today take one's place again in all those 
activities. I suppose, however, that should one try, the rulers of today 
would soon let us old fellows know that we have had our day. 

Well, if so, it was a happy one, and these thoughts, associated in our 
minds with the development and enlargement of our intellectual horizons 
during our student life, are so real and joyous a heritage that the old 
College and the scenes about it are quite as much of a reality in our 
lives as to you men who are here now. 

The memories and traditions of this old place make it splendid to 
us all. Its inspiration in our day spurred us to genuine effort. Our 
College paper. The Collegian, had to be as good as, or better than, the 
exchanges we received; our football team had to overcome the skill of 
our friends the enemy: the Hopkins, the Cadets, etc., etc., and our run- 
ners had to outstrip their competitors. It was a period wherein we 
felt that not only was individual effort due from us, for our own sakes, 
but due to the College. There was an entire absence of the indifferent 
attitude one observes in some institutions. The tone and spirit of the 
College made the students personally self-reliant, and yet a cohesive 
body of men. No man was accounted a leader whose qualities of person 
did not give him natural leadership, and yet no man felt that he was 
unfairly treated, for the student-body, though a severe critic, was fair, 
and, after all, its criticisms were inspiring. 

The students' estimates of each other, as I remember them, have 
turned out, I believe, to be just. There was among us a spirit of 
candor, and of fairness of judgment and dealing. This tone, this spirit. 



28 St. John's College Commencement and 

was handed down to lis from other days, and it is this splendid tone and 
spirit, which I know is the traditional one, which has come to you 
students of today, and which you exemplify not only in your student 
life, in your lives with each other, but in the College spirit meted out 
by you to our foeman in the intercollegiate contests. It is the spirit of 
fair play, of personal effort, of any personal sacrifice necessary to make 
the College win. 

The conditions among Vv^hich we lived, when I was here, gave us an 
extraordinary understanding of each other. There were not very many 
students in those days. Every man knew, and was brought into eon- 
tact with, every other man. Each man had the measure of the other. 
We had the advantage, which you still enjoy, of coming into personal 
and intimate contact with the instructors and professors, not only in 
the class-rooms but in our social relations, and in our athletic and other 
contests. 

You men of today have grown since our day. There are more of you. 
You accomplish more, as a body, than we were able to achieve, but 
you accomplish it with the same spirit of effort, and the same spirit 
of personal devotion to the interests of the College that we brought to 
our student life. 

As I look about me I see monuments of progress on every side. 
Woodward Hall, named to commemorate the generosity of a Mary- 
lander, has been built; the dining hall and this beautiful gymnasium, 
monuments to the generosity of Maryland, have been built. The 
courses of study have advanced and broadened; a civil engineering 
course has been introduced; the military organization has not only 
helped in the physical training of the students while here, but has made 
good soldiers of some of our men, eighteen of our graduates having 
been commissioned in the Army since my day. The great Empire 
builder, Cecil Ehodes, by his life of labor and effort, has assured to 
one alumnus of this College the rare opportunity and experience of 
residing as a student at the great English University of Oxford. I 
earnestly hope that he has associated himself there with the beautiful 
St. John's College, for which this venerable institution is named. 

The number of students here has increased; and the enthusiasm of 
the leaders of the College, both in the Faculty and in the student-body, 
is apparent everywhere. To what is this all due? It is due to the 
spirit of devoted service to the interests of the College by everybody 
connected with it; to the personal devotion and wise leadership of 
Dr. Fell, aided by the Faculty and warmly supported by the Visitors, 
and aided in no small part by an enlightened public opinion in the 
State. 

Yet McDowell Hall, our greatest link with the past, is in ashes. 
What are we to do? Keep on; work; strive; secure; maintain. This 
disaster, though great, has served to again bring to the College the 
warm interest and affection of a loyal alumni, and, I trust and believe, 
the sympathy and desire to aid, of the people of Maryland. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth x4lNniversary 29 

What are the needs of today, and what is our part? Never, in the 
history of the world, has there been a time when there was such need 
as today for trained men willing and anxious to do the world's work. 
Never has there been a time when the men who are to do the world's 
work had to be as well qualified as today. On every side the ablest 
men, the men with the clearest vision, are overburdened with the re- 
sponsible duties w^hich they have to discharge. 

Our country has with vast strides passed from a formative period, 
not only in its political institutions, but in its economic conditions, to 
a period where its stability is established. Highly developed organi- 
zations, resulting in enormous volume of business, have increased the 
necessity for intelligence and training, and as the supply of brains is 
not equal to the demand, not only is the price for trained men high, 
but the necessity for trained brains is urgent. 

Expert training, in special lines, is the need of the day. The con- 
ditions are such that it takes all the trained men it is possible to get 
to prevent waste on the one hand, and to rightly guide progress on 
the other. 

Under our American system, it is the endeavor and purpose of the 
State to provide the means of education for all the inhabitants. In 
Maryland there seems to be a great awakening to the needs and oppor- 
tunities of the present. Great attention is being paid to higher edu- 
cation. In the public school system. High Schools have been established 
throughout the State, and placed upon a satisfactory basis. The 
Governor, pursuant to an enlightened policy has appointed a commission 
to study the proper way to corelate, and get the best results for the 
people of the State from the investment being yearly made by the State 
for the education of its youth, and to find a wise and satisfactory way 
for maintaining and further developing a higher education, which the 
march of events has made essential, not only here, but everywhere. 

Throughout Europe the State has universally pushed forward, with- 
out private aid, and is pushing forward, the training of youth. The 
exactness of that training, the time given to it, and the reliability of 
the knowledge acquired by the youth of Europe, command for them 
not only occupation at home, but positions of responsibility and leader- 
ship throughout the world. 

In this country, the generosity and public spirit of our men of 
wealth have aided some of our ancient foundations, and have founded 
institutions of learning which are the marvels of the age; but these 
have not the capacity or the working plant necessary to train the vast 
body of men and women who are eager to do their part as trained 
workers in the world's work. 

In Maryland, the generosity of Johns Hopkins gave to the United 
States a University whose work has been, perhaps, as great an in- 
centive as any in America, toward the higher education. In Chicago, 
the munificence of Mr. John D. Eockefeller has built the great Uni- 
versity of Chicago, and founded it upon the broadest basis. Harvard, 



30 St. John's College Commencement and 

Yale, Princeton and Columbia have grown from small institutions to 
great seats of learning. Virginia, through all the vicissitudes follow- 
ing the War, has, as one of her proudest boasts, uniformly maintained 
and added to the annual support given to that great seat of learning, 
the University of Virginia, founded by Thomas Jefferson on truly uni- 
versity lines, and in recent years its great merits have attracted the 
gifts of many men of wealth and public spirit. 

In many of the newer States, where there were no ancient founda- 
tions, and where the public lands were within the gifts of the Nation 
or the State, new universities have arisen, whose only endowments 
have been gifts of public lands, and whose support has come and is 
provided for by the people of the respective States; with the result 
that there is at hand the means for the proper training of their youth. 

In Maryland there is no State University. Many of our institutions 
of higher learning, however, are in receipt of State aid, and this is 
eminently as it should be. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that no 
matter how much money the State should yearly expend upon the pri- 
mary and the higher education of its youth, that that money would be 
profitable and well expended. 

It has never been the genius of the Anglo-Saxon race to build new 
foundations, where there were at hand old institutions — ^in their nature 
capable of growth — ^when the needs of the time demanded development. 
We have ingrafted all our law upon the common law. There is scarcely 
a principle of law, and scarcely a statute, of which it may not be truly 
said that it is a development of the common law of our ancestors, and 
which they brought here from England. 

It seems to me clear that Maryland's duty, as to the education of 
its youth, is to be performed by aiding existing institutions generously 
and adequately. Tradition, college spirit, and the tone of institutions 
of ancient foundation, are not to be overlooked or neglected. They 
have their true place in the intellectual development, and in forming 
the character, of the students, and inspiring the ideals which, in so 
large a degree, shape their future careers. 

In building the University of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson recognized 
this in the classical character of the buildings which he designed for 
that truly great institution of learning. The new buildings which are 
being erected at Princeton are all classical in their type. They speak 
to the young mind of the continuity of civilization, evolution, and 
growth, and bring their inspiration in the reminder of the great deeds 
of men in various fields of endeavor. The same is true of the growth 
at Harvard, Yale, Chicago, and at Columbia, where all the buildings 
have been erected within the past fifteen years, the great library build- 
ing is modeled on the Parthenon, and the other University buildings 
in the Colonial style. 

The State or the man who tries to dissociate himself from and ignore 
the past loses a heritage which would make his work easier, and would 
give it a larger and fuller meaning. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 31 

Within the last few years St. John's College, one of the oldest insti- 
tutions of learning in America, has become aflfiliated with the University 
of Maryland, as its School or Arts and Sciences. That University has 
the oldest medical school, save, perhaps, one, in the United States, and 
the proud traditions of these two institutions of learning are now 
linked. 

One of the earliest acts of Maryland, as a State, was the granting of 
a charter for a University of Maryland, and at that time it was in- 
tended that St. John's should be one of the institutions which should 
form that university. Accordingly, this action on the part of the au- 
thorities of the two institutions has, in a measure, fulfilled the inten- 
tion of our ancestors. So that we have here an undergraduate school, 
most favorably located at the Capital of the State, an old town con- 
taining historical associations, inhabited by cultured and refined people, 
and without the distractions and opportunities for dissipation of a 
large city. 

In Baltimore we have graduate schools for law, medicine, and other 
graduate subjects. The students of law have an opportunity of seeing 
the practice in the State and Federal Courts of Baltimore; and the 
students of medicine have the advantage of studying their profession 
in the great hospitals which draw from a great population and from a 
great seaport. A more favorable situation can hardly be pictured for 
the training of men than is presented by these two institutions. They 
should attract, and are attracting, the generosity of private bene- 
factors, but, unfortunately, the gifts thus received are insufiS.cient to 
supply the needs of the hour. 

The duty of the alumni is plain. It is by every means in their power, 
with the spirit which characterized them when students, to make any 
personal sacrifice necessary to make the College win her place. 

Every alumnus should, from his own private fortune, give something, 
and give as often as, by sacrifice, he can. We should seek from those 
in Maryland, and elsewhere, who can give, benefactions for these insti- 
tutions. Every alumnus should seek to arouse and inspire the State to 
give liberal, generous and adequate aid toward the upbuilding and 
development of the University of Maryland and St. John's College, 
without failing, at the same time, to give the needed aid to the other 
institutions of the State. We should feel, and every citizen should be 
made to feel, that in aiding the University bearing the State's name, 
and St. John's College, help is being given not only to institutions 
which have done their full share in the work of the State, but insti- 
tutions having organizations which, by development, can care for the 
essential needs of the higher education of the youth of the State. And 
the University and the College should be ready to make generous 
acknowledgment, in the form of scholarships or other facilities, of the 
aid thus received from the State. 

Thus will the needed funds be provided now, through private gift 
and through generous State aid, for St. John's College, for the Uni- 



32 St. John's College Commencement and 

versitj of Maryland, and for the other institutions of learning of the 
State, to give to those within our borders such higher education as will 
fit our youth, now and in the future, to take their own proper places 
in the work to be done in our time and in the future. 

Build on the old. Eebuild McDowell Hall. Work with devotion for 
the development of St. John's. And if each man does his duty, the 
next twenty years will see not only the progress of the last twenty, but 
will find here an institution of which the State and every alumnus may 
be proud. 

Eollowing these addresses the keys of the Gyninasimn were delivered 
to the President of the College by the Hon. Winslow Williams, repre- 
senting the Governor of Maryland (Hon. Austin L. Crothers), and his- 
remarks were greeted with enthusiasm. 

ADDKESS AT THE DEDICATION OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE 

GYMNASIUM 

By Hon. N. Winslow Williams, 

Secretary of State of Maryland. 

Mr. President, Members of the Faculty, Alumni, and our Distinguished 
Guests : 

It is a very great pleasure to me to be with you today. I do not 
know any privilege that could come to me, as a representative of the 
State of Maryland, greater or more appealing, than to attend a function 
at this splendid old Institution of St. John's College, in the dear old 
town of Annapolis. I do not believe there is a citizen or man whose 
forefathers have come from Maryland who can listen to the sound of 
the name of Annapolis without having his heart stirred; and it is 
peculiarly appropriate that in this old city, which certainly stands for 
all that w^as first, for all that was best, in the early days of this country; 
that in this old city should be built up and maintained an institution of 
the accomplishments and of the traditions that belong to ' ' St. John 's. ' ' 

I have listened with great interest to the history, past and present, 
and the forecast of the future of this institution, delivered successively 
from the scholarly lips of the members of the Alumni. And just as an 
onlooker, as one who has observed the men who represent this College, 
and its learned, able, conscientious President, and in its capable faculty, 
and likewise the men I know who have come to this institution, and 
some of the boys who are here now; from all these things I am satis- 
fied that every word that these gentlemen said of it is true. You have 
produced great men and you are going to produce great men, and you 
are doing a great work for the State of Maryland. Not only has the 
State of Maryland reason to be proud of you, but the State of Mary- 
land owes a debt of gratitude to you, and it is the duty of the State 
of Maryland to fulfill this obligation. I do not believe that anything 
makes so much for the strength, for the progress and for the integrity 
of a community as education of the right kind, — education which teaches 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 33 

men not only how to use their minds and do their work properly, but 
education, as has been well said here today, which makes of men gentle- 
men. And I use the term * ' gentlemen ^ ' in its very best sense. I mean 
men of culture, refinement and of the inspiration of high ideals. I be- 
lieve that St. John 's College makes of men ' ' gentlemen. ' ' And you 
know we ought to treasure very closely to our hearts the gentlemen and 
the preservation of the gentlemen of Maryland. There is not a section 
of this dear old city without its intimate landmarks to recall the days 
when this was a land of chivalry, and Annapolis was its heart. 

Ladies and gentlemen, it is my privilege and opportunity today to 
tender to this College and to its work a building that is intended for 
another branch of education, that is the physical development of these 
young men, and while we all realize of course, that training of the mind 
is what goes to make for the higher manhood, we know too that no 
sustained mental strength can ever be built or maintained upon physical 
weakness. Those who have followed the history of the past four or five 
generations of the men of this country must realize that the American 
man during that time was physically deteriorating because of over- 
work, lack of rest, hurried meals and general physical exhaustion. He 
had no time for physical culture and the result was that he was fast 
becoming an over-worked, nervous dyspeptic, but I rejoice in the fact 
that within the last two generations at least, there has developed a new 
era in the physical life and training of the men of this country. Today 
they are in the saddle again as they were in the years ago; they play 
football, baseball, golf and tennis. It is that sort of training and that 
sort of living that is going to lay a splendid physical foundation for 
future generations. 

But we cannot always get the out-door exercise that we would like. 
For instance, during the past fortnight there has been so much rain 
that little else than swimming was available without; and, at Christmas 
times, even in this salubrious clime, snow often covers the ground and 
leaves only skeeing possible. Under these conditions, in order that the 
muscles may not get rusty and the tendons weak, we must have some 
place where we may keep ourselves in condition, as I recall the feats 
of my boyhood days, by " doing the giant swing " and " skinning the 
cat." We all advocate the gymnasium as a supplement to the field 
sports, but it is a pastime and a strain that may be overdone, and so 
I would warn young men that while the first law of the gymnasium 
will always be to exercise muscles, its second law should be to exercise 
moderation. 

I congratulate the students of St. John's that it is to be their privi- 
lege to have the use of this beautiful structure for a gymnasium, and 
I hope that the equipment that is to go with it is going to be what it 
ought to be, up-to-date and complete. 

I note that the State of Maryland at the close of the last session of 
the Legislature was unable to donate to this building anything more 
than $10,000, and, of course, every one knows that $10,000 won't build 



34 St. John's College Commencement and 

and equip an adequate gymnasium, and so I asked some questions of 
the Alumni, and learned you were $25,000 behind. But this matters 
little, for we would sometimes not get the things we need if we did not 
go in debt for them, and it is a habit with the public to discount the 
beneficence of the State. I hope, nevertheless, that these creditors are 
not going to be kept waiting overlong for their $25,000, and I hope that 
the State of Maryland, if it does not look upon it as an obligation, 
will at least treat it as a privilege, just as munificently, and just as 
rapidly, as she may be able, to come to your help. (Upon the entrance 
of former Governor Warfield.) 

It is a great pleasure to see, as I now do. Governor Warfield come in. 
No man has ever done more for the State of Maryland than our former 
Governor. And I think that in Major Edwin, Jr., a graduate of this 
year, he has furnished an exemplar as a student of St. John's. . . . 

I cannot pass from the question of the completion of this building 
and the paying for it, without referring to the great loss the College, 
the City and the State have suffered by reason of the fire that burned 
down McDowell Hall. 

There can be no difference of opinion as to the propriety of the re- 
construction of this building, but whether in the interest of historical 
association and sentiment the reconstruction should be along the old 
lines, working out a replica of the old building so that one of An- 
napolis 's most cherished landmarks shall be preserved, or whether we 
should be more practical and while preserving the identity by means 
of cornerstone and inscription, erect on the old site a building adapted 
to modern uses, I am not prepared to say; therefore, will leave the 
decision of this question to your President, the Faculty and Trustees, 
and I feel very confident and very hopeful that the State of !\Iary- 
land will avail itself of the privilege of at least having a hand in the 
reconstruction of McDowell Hall. 

And generally as to the matter of State aid for your College; what- 
ever the State can afford to give should be given wisely and syste- 
matically and not sporadically or haphazardly so that you may forsee 
it and reap its full benefit. 

Mr. President, in the name of his Excellency, the Governor of Mary- 
land, whose regret at his inability to be present is shared by us all, and 
in behalf of the State of Maryland, I take great pleasure in presenting 
to the Trustees of St. John's College this Gymnasium Building, and I 
dedicate it to the perpetuation of the chivalry and the manhood that 
has always belonged to and should always be the pride of the youth 
of Maryland. 

ACCEPTANCE BY THE PEESIDENT OF THE COLLEGE 

In accepting the donation from the State, Dr. Thomas Fell said: 
Eeverently, as one who recognizes the importance of the gift, I ac- 
cept the charge you have committed to my care. Enthusiastically, as 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 35 

one who realizes the possibilities it presents for promoting the welfare 
of the students, I gratefully acknowledge the benefaction of the State, — 
which you, sir, have conveyed to us in terms most pleasing. 

Athletics in connection with college life have received a great impetus 
during the last ten years. There can hardly be found in the present 
day any one of the higher institutions of learning where there is not 
established a practical gymnasium and directed as is any of the de- 
partments assigned to the pursuit of arts and sciences. It is now 
universally recognized that a well developed physique is a necessary 
adjunct to the highest intellectual attainment. A great and universal 
interest is being manifested in gymnastic exercise and out-door athletic 
sports. Column after column of our daily newspapers devoted to such 
matters bears evidence to the popularity they possess. It is a good 
sign. It indicates that outside of the college more attention is being 
paid to the results of physical training which means better health and 
improvement of the species, and which must tell favorably on the next 
generation. 

If the true tradition of athletics is that they are the legitimate fields 
of action in the most active time of life, that they diminish wickedness 
and foster cleanness of living, that the mind is strengthened by the neces- 
sary amount of attention that must be paid even to the acquirement of 
ease in simple club swinging and, above all, that they unite us in one 
forcible loyal effort at proper intervals, let us then appreciate to the 
fullest extent the inspiring results that must iiow from the proper use 
of this magnificent gymnasium. 



Alumtit lE^FltHg 



At 6.00 P. M. there was again a Dress Parade by the Cadet Corps, 
and in the evening at 7.30 P. M. the Alumni Meeting and Dinner took 
place. This dinner took place in the dining hall of the College and was 
a most enjoyable social affair. 

Prior to the dinner the regular business meeting was held in the 
Gymnasium, at which the election of officers took place, resulting as fol- 
lows : 

President — Eidgely P. Melvin, class of 1899, of Annapolis. 

First Vice-President — Eiehard J. Duvall, of Annapolis. 

Second Vice-President — Dr. Samuel M. Wagaman, class of 1893, of 
Plagerstown. 

Secretary — Prof. B. Vernon Cecil, class of 1890, of Annapolis. 

Treasurer — T. Kent Green, class of 1886, of Annapolis. 

Executive Committee — Eoger E. Simmons, class of 1897, of Baltimore; 
Frank A. Munroe, of Annapolis; Lieut. Edmund B. Iglehart, United 
States Army, class of 1894; L. B. Keene Claggett, class of 1895. 

Historiographer — John Harrison, class of 1907, of Baltimore. 



36 St. John's College Commencement and 

At the banquet the following toasts were responded to: 

" St. John's College," Dr. Thomas Fell; " Our Eldest Sister," Dr. 
Percival Hall, of Harvard ; ' ' The Public School, the University of the 
People, ' ' former Governor Edwin Warfield ; ' ' Our Elder Sister, ' ' Presi- 
dene Lyon G. Tyler, of William and Mary College ; ' ' The College and 
the State," Gen. N. Winslow Williams; " The New South Through Old 
Glasses," Capt. C. A. Johnston, of Mississippi; three cheers for the 
orange and black, '' St. John's, St. John's, St. John's," Lieut. E. B. 
Iglehart and Eidgely P. Melvin. 

Those who enjoyed the dinner were: 

Alexander Eandall, Wilfred H. Townshend, Pratt D. Phillips, T. 
Spencer Crane, Addison E. Mulliken, W. Outerbridge Spates, John W. 
Hodges, Peter B. Blanchard, ex-Judge Daniel . E. Magruder, H. E. 
Dougherty, John T. Harrison, Judge Henry D. Harlan, Aubrey E. Jack- 
son, A. Theodore Brady, E, M. Hays, Eev. John P. Hyde, A. Sydney Stal- 
lings, Howard T. Euhl, Charles A. Cummings, Elliott H. Burwell, Burton 
Proctor, Waller Bailey, Eoger E. Simmons, H. Hardings, Jr., Amos F. 
Hutchins, E. G. Parsley, Alfred Houston, George W. Wilson, W. G. EuU- 
man, D. F. Duvall, E. Clarke Fontaine, Edward E. Padgett, W. P. Chap- 
man, Evelyn A. Harrison, Dr. John P. Briscoe, Judge John P. Briscoe, 
Dr. E. H. Hutchins, William Neill, Jr., William J. Norris, Blanchard 
Eandall, E. Dallam Parsons, J. Morgan Eead, H. S. Turner, Frank A. 
Munroe, H. B. Scarborough, James Clark, Louis T. Clark, Hugh Nelson, 
John S. M. Zimmerman, Jay Williams, Bernard Carter, J. H. C. Kemp, 
Jr., Dr. Walton H. Hopkins, Prof. B. Vernon Cecil, L. Dorsey Gassaway, 
T. Kent Green, Herbert Noble, Eev. George M. Cummings, T. B. Beall, 
John M. Thompson, F. Egerton Powell, Dr. Wirt A. Duvall, James D. 
Iglehart, Edgar A. Vey, Edward T. Clark, Mayor Gordon H. Claude of 
Annapolis, T. West Claggett, L. B. Keene Claggett, Otis H. Draper, 
Jesse H. Eamsburgh, Eobert H. Williams, George Forbes, Levi T. Hecht, 
Prof. A. W. Woodcock, J. T. H. Wyse, Arthur DeP. Valk, Dennis J. 
Thompston, Heningham Gordon, James M. Munroe, Sprignal P. Wiley, 
Samuel G. Townshend, Jr., George A. Frick, Peter H. Magruder, 
William C. Devecmon, John S. Strahorn, James A. Fechtig, W. Thomas 
Kemp, Eobert Pennington, Lieut. E. Berkely Iglehart, II. S. A.; Eichard 
J. Duvall, John L. Chew, John Wirt Eandall, Eidgely P. Melvin, J. 
Vincent Jamison, Charles H. Schuster, Joseph E. Pennell, George W. 
Wilcox, E. T. Lawrence, Irving D. Ireland, Daniel E. Eandall, Walton H. 
Grant, Philip H. Harrison, William A. Strohm, W. B. Chicester, E. Earle 
Hearn, E. H. Worthington, H. O. Eidgely, George M. Eegister, Edwin 
H. Brown, Jr., Walter I. Dawkins, James D. Hamill, W, P. Norris, 
Lieut. W. Garland Fay, Marine Corps; L. S. Blades, John M. Green, 
E. O. Halbert, E. D. Padgett, Howard C. Hill. 

Ex-Governor Edwin Warfield, Dr. Thomas Fell, and all the visiting 
educators were the guests of the Alumni Association. ' 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversaet 37 



Olomm^n^m^ttt Sag 

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 16. 

The procession formed in the College Library, Woodward Hall, and 
included all the visiting delegates, in the order of the founding of their 
respective institutions, the Board of Visitors, candidates for Honorary 
Degrees, the Graduating Class, and the Faculty of the College, and pro- 
ceeded thence to the Gymnasium, where a suitable stage had been 
erected. 

The visiting delegates were as follows: 

1636 Harvard University. .Prof. Percival Hall, Gallaudet College, Wash. 

1693 William & Mary College Pres. Lyon G. Tyler. 

1701 Yale University. .Prof. W. Woolsey Johnson, 

U. S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md. 

1740 University of Pennsylvania. .Prof. Wm. Eomaine Newbold, Phila. 

1749 Washington & Lee University Pres. George H. Denny. 

1754 Columbia University. , . .Dr. Marcus Benjamin, Washington, D. C. 

1766 Eutgers College President W. H. S. Demarest. 

1776 Hampden-Sidney College. . .W. H. Whiting, Jr., Acting President. 

1782 Washington College Prof. James Eoy Micou. 

1787 Franklin & Marshall College President John S. Stahr. 

1788 Dickinson College President Geo. Edward Eeed. 

1789 Georgetown University President Joseph Himmel, S. J. 

1793 Williams College 

1794 Bowdoin College .. Hon. D. S. Alexander, 

House of Eepresentatives, Washington. 

1802 U. S. Military Academy Gen. J. Franklin Bell, U. S. A. 

1812 Princeton Theological Seminary ... Eev. Prof. Wm. P. Armstrong. 

1812 Hamilton College Eev. Alexander Alison, Princeton, N. J. 

1819 Norwich University. .Hon. F. H. Plumley, 

House of Eepresentatives, Washington. 

1819 Colgate University President Wm. H. Crawshaw. 

1821 Amherst College Professor A. J. Hopkins. 

1823 Trinity College Eev. Eomilly F. Humphries, Baltimore. 

1825 University of Virginia 

1830 Eandolph-Macon College President E. E. Blackwell. 

1830 New York University 

1833 Delaware College President Geo. A. Harter. 

1833 Haverf ord College Professor L. W. Eeid 

1837 University of Michigan 

1839 Virginia Military Institute Superintendent E. W. Nichols. 

1840 University of Notre Dame 



38 St. John's College Commencement and 

1845 U. S. Naval Academy Capt. Chas. J. Badger, U. S. N., Supt. 

1845 Tulane University. ..Prof. C. V. Cusachs, U. S. N. a., Annapolis. 

1846 Bucknell University President George H. Harris. 

1851 Northwestern University President A. W. Harris. 

1852 Loyola College President F. X. Bradj, S. J. 

1860 St. Stephens College President George B. Hopson. 

1861 Vassar College 

1864 Gallaudet College President E. M. Gallaudet. 

1864 Massachusetts Agricultural College 

1864 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. .Professor A. N. Brown, 

Annapolis, Md. 

1866 Lehigh University President Henry S. Drinker. 

1867 University of Hlinois President E. J. James. 

1868 University of the South 

1868 Cornell Univei'sity Professor Hiram Corson. 

1869 Swarthmore College Professor A. C. Humphreys. 

1876 Johns Hopkins University President Kirby Flower Smith. 

1880 Maryland Agricultural College President E. W. Silvester. 

1883 The Woman's College of Baltimore. .President E. A. Noble, D. D. 

1891 Leland Stanford University Dr. Eeinhart Cowles. 

OEDER OF EXEECISES. 

Eeading of Scripture by Eev. David H. Martin, Laurel, Md. 

Invocation by Eev. E. B. Niver, Baltimore, Md. 

Music. 

ADDEESS 
By General J. Franklin Bell, U. S. A. 
Mr. President, Members of the Faculty, Members of the Alumni, Gradu- 
ating Class, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

When I was a young boy, I once paid a compliment to an old gentle- 
man of whom I was very fond, and patting me on the shoulder, he 
replied : ' ' Well, my boy, that is flattery, but I like it ; I like it. ' ' 
In the same way, I want you to know that I like and appreciate the 
generosity of your reception, because it is inspired at least by a desire 
to be kind and courteous. 

Being a soldier, I presume I am expected to talk of war, and like all 
soldiers who have had experience, I am not a glutton for war. The 
misery, suffering and hardships inflicted on the innocent and inoffensive 
should make war odious in the mind of any right thinking man. War 
is not odious to the soldier for any other reason. But no man with a 
heart worth having can see the effects of war without hoping we never 
shall have war again. 

But, ladies and gentlemen, we are not living in paradise, and the 
millennium has not yet come. Until the millennium does come, un- 
fortunately, there will be occasions when men who love their country, 
who honor its institutions, who are willing to defend its interest, feel 
they can do these things in no other way than by taking up arms. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 39 

We frequently hear people advocating arbitration, and advocating 
disarmament. Though I am a soldier, I yield to none on this proposition. 
Beyond the shadow of a doubt, arbitration will reduce the number of 
wars very materially. With the advance of civilization, and with the 
increase of the sympathetic feelings which nations have for each other, 
it has become impossible for nations to go to war with each other 
except to uphold national honor and national interests. Nations, ladies 
and gentlemen, are not altruistic, in fact, the government of a nation 
is expected to look after the interests of its own people, and it would 
not be a government worthy of the name if it thought of sacrificing 
the interests of its own people on behalf ox those of any other nation. 
The United States comes nearer being an altruistic nation than any other 
on earth. The United States frequently sacrifices its own interests 
when it means simply money for the sake of the interests of other 
people. It has done this more than once. 

There will always arise occasions when disputes cannot be settled in 
any other way than by appealing to the sword. Let us consider for a 
moment. A band of colonists once raised the cry that taxation without 
representation was wrong. Suppose that question had been submitted 
to arbitration. Arbitration boards are sworn to decide according to 
the law. Why, there was no law which made taxation without repre- 
sentation illegal. Taxation without representation, at that time, ex- 
isted all over the face of the earth. That question could not have been 
decided except against the colonists. Does any one doubt the beneficence 
of the result of the appeal to arms on that occasion? 

Take a later case, when a nation divided on the theory that it 
was wrong for one man to own another. Could that question have been 
settled by arbitration? Had not the Supreme Court of the United 
States just decided in the Dred Scott case that slaves were property 
legally owned. I believe there is not one in this audience who will 
dispute the wisdom and the beneficence of the decision upon that ques- 
tion. 

Come closer to our own day. Suppose the difficulty between the 
United States and Spain had been submitted to arbitration. Had the 
United States, on any other basis, except to secure to humanity its dues, 
the right to interfere in the administration of Cuba? Could any board 
of arbitrators have rendered any other decision except that Spain had 
a right to govern her own colony in her own way. Does any one doubt 
for an instant the beneficent results of an appeal to arms on that 
occasion? There is only one way yet known in which such questions 
can be settled and that way is by an appeal to the sword. 



National interests usually resolve themselves into questions of trade. 
It takes a very strong justification for nations to go to war vfith each 
other but every nation on the face of the earth is considered by every 
man, by every woman, and by every enlightened person as being per- 
fectly justified in fighting for the protection of its own interests. A 



40 St. John's College Commencement and 

nation that has not the courage to fight for its own rights will not long 
retain any rights to fight for, and ought to go out of existence. And 
so there is no disgrace, there is no discredit attached to the profession 
of a man who offers himself to serve his country when the country needs 
his services. 

Referring to the question of trade, I will cite a few instances which 
are applicable. For instance, if England today had its commerce with 
the outside world completely cut off, the people of that island would 
begin to suffer with hunger, and if it were cut off for six weeks, the 
people would begin to die of starvation. If the trade of England were 
destroyed, and it were not able to resume that trade, all manufactur- 
ing industries — everything would have to stop work, it would not be 
more than six months before all the people would be starving, and 
why? Because the country has become so densely overpopulated. Now, 
there are other countries which might be said to be in the same category. 

We have such a boundless country that we do not stop to think that 
some time possibly we will be overpopulated ourselves. But take the 
statistics of the Immigration Bureau, and note the annual increase of 
population; count the number of acres of arable land we have, and it 
is only a question of simple arithmetic to ascertain how soon this country 
will become such. 

Are we looking to such questions? Are we pursuing a wise policy in 
order to lay a foundation of such power as will enable us to stand in 
the markets of the world the equal of any other nation? Ladies and 
gentlemen, in such questions one needs to be especially forewarned. 

We are all proud of the trip which our fleet recently made around 
the world, and do you know if it had been in a time of war it is 
exceedingly doubtful if the fleet could have gone from the Atlantic to 
the Pacific at all, and if it had succeeded it would not have arrived in 
good condition; because in time of war we cannot hire colliers from 
other nations to carry coal; because in time of war we cannot enter 
neutral ports, nor can we buy coal even from our best friends. 

Is there any other nation that could have performed that feat? Yes — ■ 
one — England, only, England took possession of the Falkland Islands 
and she has had to fight several wars to retain them, but she saw in 
those islands an invaluable possession, and now she is building there a 
first-class naval station. 

Nations must see into the future and must take cognizance of what 
must happen in the future. . . . Look at Alaska. Everybody thought 
that Mr. Seward, Secretary of State, was an idiot when he paid 
$7,000,000 for this waste of ice and snow which in the last ten years 
has produced something like $300,000,000. 



There are two places where the United States may some time have to 
fight in order to get its share of the trade. There may be others but I 
mention these two. South America and China. I will not consider 
South America. Let us consider, for a moment, China. Do you know 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 41 

that notwithstanding the fact that the foreign trade of China has only 
been scratched along the coast, that the harbor of Hong Kong has the 
largest tonnage in the world. Up to ten or twelve years ago, China 
had not a railway leading into the interior of the Empire. All the 
goods and articles of commerce that were transported to the interior of 
China were conveyed on wheelbarrows pushed by men. They were so in- 
fluential that they have held back the railway development of China. 
The trade, now, however, is increasing in leaps and bounds. 

Now, ladies and gentlemen, do you imagine that the rest of the world 
is going to give the United States its share of that trade for nothing, 
just as a free gift? The United States has got to be prepared to de- 
mand and get it by having power behind its demands to enforce them. 
No question about that, and so with the trade in South America. 

Now what has this to do with this Institution? Well, it has this, 
ladies and gentlemen. The Anglo-Saxon race has inherited a natural 
suspicion and a lack of confidence and distrust in a standing army. But 
we need military force. We need something which the Government can 
call on when necessity arises. Whence must it come? From the citizen 
soldier. The time is pressing when it is necessary to have professional 
soldiers. The profession of a soldier is one that has to be learned, and 
the best time to learn it is while one is young. Now, this Institution has 
been, for many years, turning out graduates who, when called on to take 
a full part in any military affair, have never been found wanting. . . . 
Let me say that if West Point, which is universally acknowledged to 
be the best military school on earth, had had the difficulties to contend 
with which this Institution has successfully overcome, who can assert 
that its product would have been more creditable than has been the pro- 
duct of this Institution? You have indeed much to be proud of. . . . 
Now, I have mentioned the citizen soldier — mentioned the excellent work 
which this Institution has for many years been doing, and what does 
that mean? It means simply this, that a man in order to be an officer 
in the army must be educated for the business. And it is a pity if the 
authorities of this great State do not realize what an asset they have in 
these young men in making officers and soldiers. 

Last year, assisted by Dr. Fell and the presidents of a few other insti- 
tutions, we drafted a law to be introduced in Congress, which proposed 
to pay for each of a hundred students . . . and only five institutions 
were selected because of their character, and because of the value of 
the work they were doing, and this Institution was one of the five. 

I am sure you will excuse me for closing with one anecdote that has 
a flavor which will be recognized here. A young negro girl went with 
her mistress from the South to a Northern watering place, and soon 
after her arrival was invited to a ball. Upon her return from the ball 
her mistress saw that she was displeased about something, so she said 
to her, '' Why, Maria, what is the matter? What are you so put out 
about?'' " Why," said Maria, 



42 St. John's College Commencement and 

suited me. He came up to me and asked me, ' Miss Maria, ain't your 
programe done been full yet,' and I 'clare to goodness, I had eaten only 
one plate of ice cream. ' ' 

Now, observing that your programme is full, I would be an inhuman 
wretch if I took more of your time. 

Music. 

Then followed brief congratulatory addresses, as follows: 
By Professor Hall, William and Mary College. 
Mr. President, Gentlemen of the Board of Trustees and Faculty, Students 
of tlie College, Ladies aiid Gentlemen: 

I bring you today the greetings and congratulations of the College of 
William and Mary. The ancient College of King William and Queen 
Mary tenderly greets King William's School now developed into St. 
John's College. Williamsburg, the City of William, greets Annapolis, 
the City of Anne. Leah greets Eaehel. 

Many are the links that bind together our two ancient colleges and 
our venerable Commonwealths. We are sprung from the same stock. We 
hold the same traditions. In your veins as in ours courses the blood of 
the Cavalier and the Puritan, those two mighty civilizations which have 
together built up our great republic. Francis Nicholson, one of the 
founders of William and Mary, was the founder of King William's 
School. He moved your Capital from St. Mary's to Providence, now 
Annapolis; ours, from Jamestown to Williamsburg. He was twice 
Deputy Governor of Virginia, and, after his ardent temperament stirred 
up great commotion in Virginia, was sent here as your Governor. Ardent 
in politics and in religion, he was also a most ardent lover. Eejected 
by one of the belles of Virginia, he swore that, if she married any other 
man, he would kill three men: the groom, the minister that performed 
the marriage ceremony, and the justice that issued the license. Suspect- 
ing that the minister of Hampton Parish favored another suitor, he 
walked up to him one day and knocked off his hat. 

Again I say William and Mary sends her love and her greetings to 
her younger sister, St. John 's College. The mother of colleges, in her 
antecedents older than even Harvard herself, feels a just pride today in 
this gathering of her daughters. She congratulates them all, wishing 
them God-speed. Especially tender is her feeling towards this noble 
seat of learning founded by the colonial fathers of Maryland. Her heart 
warms towards the small college, who like herself has been engaged 
in the making of men and the creation of great ideas and great ideals. 
Jefferson, you remember, tells us, ' ' Whatever I am, I owe it to William 
Small, professor in William and Mary College. ' ' 

In a recent issue of one of our magazines, the question was raised, 
" Shall the small college live?" We are often told that the small col- 
lege must die, must be squeezed out of existence between the high school 



One Hundeed and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 43 

and the university. God forbid! Let not such a character-building 
force perish from the earth. Is there room for the small college"? Does 
it justify its right of existence? Yes, we answer, a thousand times, 
Yes, The small college shall live, as long as Dartmouth has her Webster, 
St. John's her Key and her Pinkney, William and Mary her Jefferson, 
her Monroe and her Marshall, and as long as men are not manufactured 
but created by the breath of God. 

By President Joseph Himmel, S. J., Georgetov^n University. 

It gives me great pleasure, in bearing the congratulations of George- 
town University to St. John's College, on the completion of 125 years 
of service, to dwell on the tie which, it seems to me, binds the two insti- 
tutions together in an exceptional way. 

Not only am I, the President of Georgetown University, also an 
alumnus of St. John 's College, but, in the years gone by, when the Jesuit 
College at Georgetown was founded, it was by Archbishop Carroll, who 
was also the first president of the Board of Visitors and Governors of 
St. John's College. 

It is, therefore, with more than formal courtesy that the institution 
over which I preside sends her greetings: It is, rather, as a sister col- 
lege, claiming a kind of hlood relationship in origin, typifying that spirit 
of tolerance for vdiich Maryland has become a byword of honor in the 
land. 

Georgetown, therefore, of all the colleges honoring the occasion, has, 
possibly, most reason to praise and thank the Providence which has given 
St. John's strength to endure for so many years, and to wish for her 
a glorious future. 

By Dr. Marcus Benjamin, Columbia University. 

In 1754, just thirty years before this College came into existence. 
King's College was founded in New York City. Subsequent to the times 
of the War of the Eevolution that institution of learning become 
Columbia University. 

I have the honor on behalf of your older sister in learning to extend 
to you cordial congratulations on your One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth 
Anniversary. It is to be regretted that President Butler found him- 
self unable to be present on this occasion, but I am sure that were he 
here he would recall with words of graceful appreciation the fact that 
Columbia's greatest president, Frederick A. P. Barnard, was an honorary 
alumnus of this college. As one who has followed science as a profes- 
sion I cannot but congratulate you on the fact that John Henry Alex- 
ander, perhaps the foremost of those among your Alumni who have pur- 
sued science was a friend and contemporary of President Barnard's. 

I have the honor on behalf of my Alma Mater to extend her most 
hearty felicitations to you on this occasion. 



44 St. John's College CommencemeinT and 

De. George Edward Eeed, President of Dickinson College. 

Mr. President, Gentlemen of the Board of Trustees, Members of the 
Alumni, Ladies and Gentlemen of Annapolis: 

I have been in Annapolis for nearly twenty-four hours now, with very 
little sleep. During this time, I have heard a great deal about St. John's 
College. And I have very much the feeling of the Queen of Sheba, when 
she had seen all of Solomon's wisdom, and all his glory, — the glory of 
his kingdom. All that she could do was to bow her head and say that 
the half had not been told. And that is the feeling I have, Mr. Presi- 
dent, after listening for twenty-four hours on this occasion. And I am 
persuaded that the half has not been told about St. John's. 

When we walk around these ancient buildings, we feel that we are in 
the presence of antiquity. St. John's is claiming about everything for 
the future, and General Bell put a climax on the whole business when 
he said that West Point was hardly in it with St. John's. Ladies and 
gentlemen, I would like to know what else there is to live for; and the 
St. John's boys, these undergraduates, sit here and take it all in as if it 
were true. They believe it from the depth of their soul. 

I heard a story some time ago of a St. John's man who had a dream. 
He dreamed of paradise. He asked the keeper at the pearly gates for 
admission to heaven. The gate keeper said to him : * ' Where do you 
hail from?" '' Prom St. John's College, Annapolis." ** Well, you 
can't come in here." He felt very badly, but stood by and watched 
others as they came up. Soon a man came up and asked for admission. 
* ' Where are you from ? " "I am a Harvard man. " ' ' Well there are 
plenty of Harvard men in here. You may come in." Then he saw a 
Yale man come up. ** Yes, you can come in. There are plenty of Yale 
men in here." Then a Princeton man came up, and one from William 
and Mary, only one; then one from Dickinson, and all were admitted. 
The St. John's man then walked up to the keeper and asked how it was 
that a Harvard man, a Yale man, a Princeton man, a William and Mary 
man, a Dickinson man, all could enter but not one from St. John's. 
*' Well, sir," said the guardian, ** we only admit here men whose con- 
dition require further improvement. ' ' 

The College which I have the honor to serve celebrated her One Hun- 
dred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary a year ago, and the occasion was 
graced, more than graced, it was adorned by the presence of Dr. Fell, 
and very reluctantly Dr. Fell yielded the point that Dickinson was one 
year older than St. Johns. . . . 

Now, I desire on the part of Dickinson College, to express congratu- 
lations on the history of these 125 years, and the great achievements 
you have successfully performed. Dr. Fell, on this occasion, has received 
a great deal of praise, and I believe he must have grown fifteen years 
younger during the last twenty-four hours on account of the many good 
things said concerning him and his administration. ... I am a married 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 45 

man. A wife is an expensive luxury but a good thing. I think you 
ought to rise and give a cheer for the President's wife. I am convinced 
that she is the power behind the throne. The fame and glory belongs 
to her as well as to Dr. Fell. 

Now, just one word for the old College. I congratulate the old Col- 
lege because it seems to stand for some good. You have been a Col- 
lege of the old fashioned sort. I heard with regret that you are going 
to introduec engineering in this College. . . . 

But we want men of culture — that kind of culture that you get in 
colleges like St. John's, We want to develop men who shall be splendid 
men in the great qualities of leadership in the State of Maryland. Men 
who are not working for money primarily but working for the good of 
humanity and content to lead lives of comparative poverty as gentlemen. 

I am glad to feel that St. John's stands for another thing. In the 
historical sketch concerning the College on the first page of this 
pamphlet I read that an Act was passed in 1671 by the Legislature for 
'* founding and erecting a school or college for the education of youth 
in learning and virtue " and further that the Act recites that the school 
was established for ' * the propagation of the Gospel and education of 
youth in good letters and manners. ' ' 

Ladies and gentlemen, I hope the day will never come in the colleges 
and universities of the country when the great and essential principles 
of religion shall fail to be emphasized in the life of these institutions. 
We cannot put too much emphasis on the importance of religion in the 
life of colleges and universities of the United States, and I hope St. 
John's will emphasize this in the future. 

. . . The hero of college life in our days apparently is not the success- 
ful scholar, not the valedictorian, but the man who is the best baseball 
player, or the man who can make the best center rush on the football 
team. The boys will get up at two o'clock in the morning to welcome 
the return of their victorious team, but where is the one who will put 
himself to any inconvenience to go and listen to a student deliver an 
excellent address. Brawn is good but brain is a dozen times better. 
We want good, stout bodies, but above all exalt a high intellectual 
standard. 

St. John's though has stood for these things in the past and I trust 
she will stand for them in the future. 

I present you the congratulations of the venerable College which 
I serve. 

President Henry Sturgis Drinker, of Lehigh University, tendered the 
following letter of congratulation: 

'' Lehigh University extends cordial greeting and congratulations to 
St. John's College, on the One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 
of the granting of her present charter, and sends hearty wishes for a 



46 St. John's College Commencement and 

long continuance of the good work that St. John 's has done in the past 
for the spread of culture and the promotion of true scholarship in our 
land. 

Henry S. Drinker, 

Fresident. ' ' 

And said: 

I have been much impressed bj what I have seen here, and by what 
I have heard in the previous addresses of the spirit of high honor, 
patriotic impulse, and sterling worth, pervading St. John's College, a 
spirit that has come down as a precious heritage from the past, and that 
is cherished as an asset, — a hall-mark, — of surpassing value today. 

It was, I think, Lord Eldon (and my brethren of the Bar here present 
will correct me if I misquote), who on being consulted as to the fitness 
of a candidate for a Judgeship, said : ' ' The first requisite of a good 
Judge is that he shall be a gentleman; if he knows a little law, so much 
the better." 

The students of St. John's live in an atmosphere of Southern hos- 
pitality, honor, and right-doing, in an Institution with a record inspiring 
high ideals in the student-body and Alumni. All honor to Old St. John's 
for her work in the past and example in the present. We, of the 
younger generation of colleges are honored to be here today to sit at 
her feet and draw inspiration and encouragement from her example 
and record. 

Professor Hiram Corson, representing Cornell University, presented 
the following beautifully inscribed in colors on sheepskin: 

'■ ' Cornell University, by her representative. Professor Hiram Corson, 
sends cordial greetings to St. John's College on the happy occasion of 
the One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of the granting of her 
Charter. 

Wm. a. Hammond, 
Secretary of the Faculty. ' ' 
''Ithaca, New York, June, 1909." 

By Professor Kirby Flower Smith, Johns Hopkins University. 

In accepting the honor of an invitation to the ceremonies in cele- 
bration of the One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of your 
school of learning the Johns Hopkins University whom I have the 
pleasure of representing upon this occasion, desires to pay an especial 
tribute of interest and regard to the sister institution whose brilliant 
sons have so often come to us and won further distinction in later years. 

To your loyal Alumni, to your many friends, to all who rejoice in a 
success well earned, the tale of your struggles and triumphs, the living 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 47 

memory of those dauntless souls of other days by whom your long and 
honorable history is rendered the more illustrious, must needs be a 
lesson, a possession and an inspiration. 

We esteem it a privilege to assure you of our hearty sympathy with 
your pride and joy on this memorable occasion and of our earnest 
wishes for the ever increasing prosperity of your institution in the years 
yet to come. 

By Professor James Eoy Micou, Washington College. 

Mr. President, Visitors and Governors of St. John's: 

It gives me great pleasure to be today the bearer to St, John 's of 
the hearty good wishes of Washington College. 

Every school boy reads in his Cicero that all the arts which make for 
culture have a common bond and are united by a kind of kinship. 

We, theretore, Vv'ho are priests in the temples of culture, must neces- 
sarily feel the warmest interest in the welfare of every shrine where 
incense is being offered to the gods of truth and wisdom. 

But if this feeling of brotherhood did not exist between all of our 
colleges, certainly it should exist between Washington and St. John's. 
Chartered by the Legislature of Maryland within the short space of two 
years of each other, designed to be but parts of one whole, the Uni- 
versity of Maryland, situated but a few miles apart, it is reasonable 
and right that each should rejoice at any success that the other may 
achieve and bemourn any loss that it may suffer. 

When, therefore, during the past winter w"e saw in the papers the 
startling headline ' "' St. John 's College Destroyed by Fire, ' ' we were 
much grieved, fearing, in language of the historian, that one of ' ' eyes 
of Greece had been put out. ' ' 

It was vrith great relief that we learned on further investigation that 
only McDowell Hall had been consumed and that it would soon rise 
again enlarged and beautified. Certainly this happy celebration removes 
all uneasiness as to the future of St. John 's College. 

As she has sat for one hundred and twenty-five years beside the sj)ark- 
ling v\^aters of the beautiful Severn, giving a mother's care to all who 
have come to seek her maternal blessing, so, no doubt, for many genera- 
tions she will continue to teach that the life is more than meat and the 
body more than raiment and that any land fares ill where wealth 
accumulates and men decay. And while she is adding to the already 
long list of her sons who have gone forth to show by their lives as 
jurists, legislators and statesmen the value of her teachings, none of her 
sister colleges will Avish a heartier God-speed than will Washington. 

Music. 



48 St. John's College Commencement and 

Amarttng uf OI^rttfitat^B of ItBltnrlmtt ttttb PmeB 

Certificates of Distinction and Prizes were awarded, and Degrees 
conferred, as follows, by President Fell: 

Prize of $25.00 offered by the Alumni Association of St. John's Col- 
lege to the Senior Class for the best Original Oration, awarded to 
William B. Ennis, Annapolis, Md. 

President's Medal for Oratory to members of the Junior Class, 
awarded to Webster S. Blades, Choptank, Md. 

President's Prize for Biblical Study, awarded to L. Claude Bailey, 
Quantico, Md. 

Prize of $100.00 for Excellence in Mathematics (Freshman Class), 
awarded to Philip Langdon Alger, Annapolis, Md. 

Music. 

Conferring of Degrees on Graduates. 

Bachelor of Arts. 

Allan H. St. Clair, First Honor Eocks, Md. 

Charles Weaver, Second Honor Middletown, Md. 

Lloyd C. Bartgis Myersville, Md. 

J. Irvin Dawson Leonardtown, Md. 

J. Alexander Kendrick Eipley, Md. 

Arthur Euf us Laney Cumberland, Md. 

Harrison McAlpine Lonaconing, Md. 

Edwin Warfield Woodbine, Md. 

Bachelor of Science. 

William B. Ennis Annapolis, Md. 

Clarence T. Johnson Laurel, Md. 

E. Elmer Jones Lynch 's, Md. 

Albert Knox Starlings Annapolis, Md. 

Master of Arts. 

J. Morgan Eead B. A., 1882; D. D., 1900. 

Samuel M. Wagaman B. A., 1893; M. D., 1901. 

Emmet Earl Hearn B. A., 1906; LL. B., 1909. 

Alfred Houston B. A., 1906; LL. B., 1909. 

Lee L Hecht B. A., 1907; LL. B., 1909. 

Conferring of Honorary Degrees. 

The Honorary Degrees conferred, and those receiving them follow 
in order: 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 49 

Master of Arts. 

Samuel Maddox, Esq Washington, D. C. 

Prof. C. W. Stryker Annapolis, Md. 

Doctor of Letters. 

Prof. Eugene M. Hays San Antonio, Texas. 

Prof. E. J. Clarke Chestertown, Md. 

Doctor of Science. 

Prof. B. V. Cecil Annapolis, Md. 

Prof. Francis LeEoy Satterlee New York City. 

Doctor of Laws. 

Hon. Thomas J. Morris Baltimore. 

Eandolph Winslow, M. D Baltimore. 

Hon. Francis Lyne Stetson New York City. 

Hon. Wm. Barclay Parsons New York City. 

James T. Woodward, Esq New York City. 

Doctor of Divinity. 

Eev. E. B. Niver Baltimore. 

Eev. David H. Martin Laurel, Md. 

Eev. J. Grardner Murray Baltimore. 

In presenting the candidates for the Honorary Degree of Master of 
Arts, Professor Waddell said: 

Mr. President, I have the honor to present as a candidate for the 
Honorary Degree of Master of Arts, Clarence W. Stryker, Bachelor of 
Arts of Union College, New York. In offering his name for this degree 
the Faculty wishes to testify to the efficient and conscientious services 
rendered by him. 

And, also, I have the honor to present as a candidate for the Honorary 
Degree of Master of Arts, Samuel Maddox, of Washington, who was 
graduated from this College in 1871, and has since won distinction for 
himself in the practice of Law at the Bar of Washington, D. C. He has 
faithfully manifested his interest in his Alma Mater, and has been ready 
to serve her whenever he has had opportunity to do so. 

Professor Stryker said: Mr. President, I have the honor to present 
to you Mr. Eugene M. Hays, who was graduated from St. John's 
College in June, 1890, and received the Master's Degree in 1893. Since 
that time he has devoted himself to the work of education, and now 
holds a very responsible position in the West Texas Military Academy 
at San Antonio, Texas. The Board of Visitors and Governors recom- 
mends him for the Degree of Doctor of Letters, in recognition of his 
ability and usefulness. 

For the same reasons they also commend to you for the Degree of 
Doctor of Letters, Mr. Edward Julius Clarke, Bachelor of Arts, St. 
John's College, 1881, and Master of Arts, 1892, now holding the Chair 
of English at Washington College, Chestertown, Maryland. 



50 St. John's College Commencement and 

Professor Bartgis McGlone then came forward and said: 

Mr. President, I have much pleasure in presenting Francis LeEoy 
Satterlee, Jr., for the degree of Doctor of Science. He was graduated 
with the degree of Master of Arts in 1903, and has been a teacher and 
lecturer in physics, radiology and chemistry for the past nine years in 
connection with the University of New York. He has also been the 
inventor of scientific apparatus of a most original and useful character 
in the department of radiology. 

In introducing Professor B. Vernon Cecil, Lieutenant Iglehart said: 
It gives me great pleasure to present to you for the degree of Doctor 
of Science, Professor B. Vernon Cecil, Bachelor of Arts, 1890 ; Master 
of Arts, 1897; Professor of Physics and Chemistry since 1896, and Vice- 
President of St. John's College. 

The Board of Visitors desires to express their appreciation of his 
services, and to recognize the ability with which he has performed the 
duties of his chair. He has done much to promote the attachment of 
students to their Alma Mater by actively aiding them in their athletic 
and other college organizations. 

The following were Professor Cecil's remarks in introducing the 
Honorable Thomas John Morris: 

Mr. President, I have now the further pleasure of acting for the 
Board of Visitors and Governors in presenting to you the Honorable 
Thomas John Morris, of Baltimore, on v^hom they wish to bestow the 
degree of Doctor of T.aws, in recognition of his distinguished attain- 
ments and qualities. Judge Morris is a Bachelor of Arts and Master of 
Arts of Harvard Universitj^, Vice-President of the American Unitarian 
Association, and a member of the American Bar Association. He was 
a delegate to the Universal Congress of Lawyers and Jurists held at 
St. Louis in 1904, and is now Vice-President of the Enoch Pratt Free 
Library of Baltimore and Trustee of the Johns Hopkins University of 
the same city. He has been United States District Judge for Maryland 
since 1879. 

In presenting Mr. Francis Lynde Stetson, Professor Cecil said: I 
have the further honor of introducing to you Mr. Francis Lynde Stetson^ 
attorney-at-law of New York City, whom the Board of Visitors and 
Governors take pleasure in recommending for the degree of Doctor of 
Laws, feeling it an honor to create a tie which will bind one so dis- 
tinguished as he to the College as an alumnus. Mr. Stetson is a 
Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts of Williams College, and Bachelor 
of Laws of Columbia University. He is senior member of the law firm 
of Stetson, Jennings and Eussell, practising in connection with the 
largest financial interests, and director in many important financial 
companies. He is a trustee of Williams College and a member of the 
Phi Beta Kappa Society and the Alpha Delta Phi Fraternity. 

The following were Professor Cecil's remarks in introducing Mr, Wil- 
liam Barclaj" Parsons: I have much pleasure in introducing to you 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fitth Anniversary 51 

Mr. William Barclay Parsons, of New York Gitj, Bachelor of Arts 
and Civil Engineer of Columbia University. Mr. Parsons was Chief 
Engineer of the New York Subway from 1894 to 1905; he was a mem- 
ber of the Isthmian Canal Commission in 1905. Is now Trustee of 
Columbia University, Vestryman of Trinity Parish, New York, and a 
member of the American Society of Civil Engineers and of the Institute 
of Civil Engineers of Great Britain. He is the author of numerous 
professional works, and is endorsed by President Butler of Columbia 
University and by other prominent men. 

In recognition of his distinguished services, not only in his own pro- 
fession, but through it to the Nation at large, the Board of Visitors 
and Governors desire to honor him w4th the degree of Doctor of Laws. 

In introducing Dr. Randolph Winslow, Professor Cecil said: It gives 
me much pleasure to introduce to you Dr. Randolph Winslow, of Balti- 
more, Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts of Haverford College, and 
Doctor of Medicine of the University of Maryland. He is Professor 
of Surgery in the University of Maryland, and author of many treatises 
on different branches of surgery, as well as of interesting articles on 
travel, both in this and in foreign countries. He is noted for his 
skilled practice in his special branch of the science of medicine. 

In presenting him for the degree of Doctor of Laws, the Board of 
Visitors and Governors desire to recognize the active interest he has 
manifested in promoting the welfare of St. John's College. 

The Honorable Henry D. Harlan, LL. D., of Baltimore, next arose 
and said: 

In the name of the Board of Visitors and Governors of St. John's 
College, it is my pleasure to propose to you one whose services to the 
College alone would entitle him to recognition at her hands, but whose 
other distinguished qualities I will briefly outline. 

Mr. James T. Woodward, of New York City, is the President of the 
Hanover National Bank and director in many financial institutions. 
As head or the Clearing House Association of New York he took a 
prominent part in controlling the financial crisis through which we have 
recently passed, and in averting national disaster. His reputation as 
a financier is such that in negotiations preceding bond sales by the 
United States Treasury, and in the determination of national financial 
policies his vieW'S are influential and earnestly sought after by the 
Government. 

But he has a broader sphere of influence than that Avhich he fills even 
as the president of a great bank. By his generous gifts to churches 
and to educational and charitable institutions he has performed a work 
of inestimable value in his native State of Maryland. He has taken 
an active part in the discussion of civic and national questions and has 
shown a deep interest in the cause of education. 

Thus, in many spheres of action, he has served well his day and 
generation. 



52 St. John's College Commencement and 

I ask that the College mark its appreciation of this by conferring on 
him the degree of Doctor of Laws. 

The Honorable John Wirt Eandall, LL. D., of Annapolis, said: 

Mr. President, the honor of presenting to you the candidates for the 
degree of Doctor of Divinity has devolved upon me, and it is with 
great pleasure that I bring before you the names of the following gentle- 
men, and their distinguished characteristics, which have led the Board 
of Visitors and Governors to desire to express their appreciation of 
the same by bestowing upon them the degree of Doctor Divinity. 

The Eev. Edwin Barnes Niver, of Baltimore, is a Bachelor of Arts 
of Brown University (1893) and Master of Arts of George Washington 
University (1895). He is also Bachelor of Divinity of the Episcopal 
Theological Seminary of Cambridge, Massachusetts (1892). He served 
as Curate at St. Paul's Church, Providence, E. I., from 1892 to 1894 
and at Christ Church, Baltimore, from 1894 to 1897. While still hold- 
ing the last named position, in 1897, he was elected Eector of Christ 
Church, and is still holding that position. He has been a delegate to 
several of the General Conventions of the Protestant Episcopal Church, 
Chairman of the Committee on Missions for ten years. Trustee of the 
Church Home and of the Hannah More Academy, the Diocesan School 
for girls, is Chaplain of the Naval Brigade, and Chairman of the Trus- 
tees of the Cathedral Foundation of the Diocese of Maryland. 

The Eev. Daniel H. Martin, of Laurel, Maryland, is a graduate of 
Drew Theological Seminary (1898) and is now a member of the Balti- 
more Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He became a 
Deacon in 1900, and an Elder in 1902. 

The Eev. John Gardner Murray, of Baltimore, received his early 
education at Wyoming Seminary, Kingston, Pennsylvania, and his 
theological training at Drew Theological Seminary. He was made 
Deacon in 1893 and Priest in 1894, and became Eector of the Church 
of the Advent, Birmingham, Alabama. In 1903 he was called to the 
Eectorship of the Church of St. Michael and All Angels in Baltimore, 
and is still holding that position, though elected to be the Bishop Co- 
adjutor of the Diocese of Maryland, at the recent Diocesan Convention 
in May last. He has twice previously been elected to the Episcopate, 
but each time has declined. He is Archdeacon of Baltimore, and a 
member of the Standing Committee of the Diocese. Having been, my- 
self, a member of the Convention which elected him to the high honor 
of the Episcopate, it is with exceptional pleasure that I now present 
him to you for the distinction of the degree of Doctor of Divinity. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversaey 53 



By Prof. Wm. Eomaine Newbold, Ph. D., 
University of Pennsylvania. 
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

It gives me great pleasure to appear before you today as a repre- 
sentative of the University of Pennsylvania and to extend to St. John's 
College the greetings and good wishes of my own Alma Mater upon 
this auspicious occasion. Your President has already alluded to the 
link which has in the past connected the two institutions, and I am 
glad to feel that the ancient tie is not forgotten, and that as an 
alumnus and representative of the same institution which gave you 
your first president, I have received from you today a warmer welcome 
because of the services which he rendered you and the honor in which 
you hold his name. 

In reading over the history of St. John's College I have been im- 
pressed by the striking parallel between its foundation and development, 
and that of the University of Pennsylvania. Both institutions were 
established primarily, not to train men for the ministry, as were Harvard, 
Yale, and Princeton, but to provide a liberal education for the boys of 
the Colonies. Both were founded as academies, although St. John's 
began her career sixty-five years before the Academy of Philadelphia 
was founded by Franklin. Both were later transformed into colleges, 
and although St. John's has not yet taken the third step, that which 
parts the college from the university, it is only because that step has 
not been found necessary to meet the needs of the community in which 
she is situated. 

There are in the lives of institutions, as of men, occasions, birthdays 
perhaps, or the anniversaries of unusually important steps, when a review 
of the past, and an appreciation of the present seem especially ap- 
propriate. We have reached today in the life of St. John's College 
such an occasion, but you will, I trust, pardon me if instead of looking 
back upon those features in the history of St. John's which distinguish 
her from other institutions of learning, I direct your attention rather to 
those which she shares with many others, and especially to the one which 
she shares in a peculiar way with the University of Pennsylvania. We 
both were founded expressly to provide a liberal education for those 
who wanted it. Have we done so? Are we doing so? And what of the 
future? Is the intention of our founders still our intention? Or are 
we finding it an unpraeticable or at least a less desirable end than other 
ends which are now forced upon us? 

What this liberal education of our founders was, you all, I have no 
doubt, know well. At that time practically all the learning which had 
been accumulated by man in the course of his long and toilsome ascent 
from barbarism to civilization, and by far the greater and most precious 



54 St. John's College Commencement and 

part of his literary and artistics heritage, were locked up in the Greek 
and Latin languages. As a matter of course, therefore, the study of 
Latin and Greek was the chief element in a liberal education. The 
study of mathematics was also admitted, largely because Plato had 
taught that it afforded the best available mental training. Logic was 
usually admitted, some times a little philosophy and rhetoric, and usually 
some study of the Bible and Christian evidences. It was all very simple, 
and probably no better scheme could then have been devised. 

But in the last one hundred and fifty years the life of civilized man 
has passed through changes more profound and far reaching than had 
been witnessed by any thousand years of his previous history. Indeed, 
in the whole expanse of recorded history there are but two events, in 
the purely secular field — namely the invention of printing and the dis- 
covery of America — which exceed in importance any one of a half dozen 
or more of the achievements of the last century and a half. Our great- 
grandfathers witnessed the invention of the steam engine and its ap- 
plication to industry, our grandfathers saw its application to transporta- 
tion by water and land; our fathers saw the introduction of the tele- 
graph and the linking of the continents by submarine cables; we have 
seen the development of electric lighting, and the invention of the tele- 
phone; you of the rising generation have yourselves witnessed the dis- 
covery of the wireless telegraph; you have also witnessed the perfecting 
of the explosive engine, which alone has made possible the power boat, 
the automobile, and within this last year has at length transformed into 
reality one of man's most cherished dreams, — the mastery of the air. 

Every one of these inventions, both directly and indirectly through 
the demands which it makes upon other workers, has created new indus- 
tries which give employment to vast armies of men. And yet I have 
not enumerated a hundredth, nor a thousandth part of the inventions, 
the applications of science to the satisfaction of old or of hitherto un- 
felt wants, which have transformed industrial life in all civilized lands, 
and have called into being hosts of workers who could have found no 
place in the relatively simple social organization of our ancestors. And 
from every one of these industries, whether old or new, came an impera- 
tive demand for trained men, men possessed in a very high degree of 
special knowledge, fitted to lead those armies. Where were such men 
to be had? Our old system of liberal education could not provide them. 
If they were to be provided at all, it must be, either by the creation of 
new educational instruments, or by the adaptation of the old to ends 
for which they were not originally designed. Both methods have in 
fact been adopted, but I shall direct your attention to the second only. 

The colleges and universities of America rose to the occasion. In 
almost every institution of our land new courses, new departments, were 
created, designed to meet the new jieeds, and the end is not yet. 

The effect of this step upon the institutions as wholes has been 
astonishing. Colleges that had pursued the same even course for 
generations without material growth in numbers of studentf^^ have ex- 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 55 

panded into great universities with hundreds of professors and thou- 
sands of students upon their rolls. But what has been its effect upon 
the old liberal course of studies which many of these institutions were 
originally founded to provide? 

In the first place, the older branches of learning, Greek, Latin, 
Mathematics, Philosophy, have been immensely benefited by the intro- 
duction of improved methods of investigation and of teaching. We 
have better teachers, more courses, better lexicons, grammars, and texts, 
and in consequence it is possible today to get a better knowledge of 
these subjects in any American college than it was even fifty years ago. 

In the second place, the older scheme of studies has been enlarged 
by the introduction of new branches. Elaborate provisions have been 
made for the teaching of English literature and philology, of French 
and German, Italian, Spanish, Hebrew, and other languages and litera- 
tures, of history in all its divisions, of physics and chemistry, of botany 
and zoology, of political economy, political science, sociology, finance, 
international law, ethics, psychology, aesthetics, the fine arts, and so on. 
It is true that the introduction of each one of these new branches into 
the liberal course of study was nearly always vigorously contested by 
the representatives of the older subjects, upon the ground that the 
new subject was not really " liberal." The new subject nearly always 
succeeded in getting in, and it usually endeavored to prove its right to 
the magic adjective '' liberal," but I am afraid that these contests 
have to some extent obscured to the minds of many what that word 
really means. 

As a result of this enormous expansion in the work oiiered by the 
college, it has become impossible for any student to take it all. The 
student must select some to the exclusion of others. But as yet no 
principle of selection satisfactory to all has been discovered. Some 
urge that certain studies should be given the preference because they 
are more " liberal " than others, thus renewing the old battle at a 
second line of defenses; others claim that the principle of utilit}'' should 
rule, that is to say that the student should select those studies which 
will be most useful in his future career, and so on. I shall not weary 
you with too many technical details, for these problems are familiar to 
you all, and the two which I have named are sufficient to bring the whole 
question before you. 

But all observers are, I believe, agreed that in our modern colleges 
the drift has set in definitely and strongly away from the old subjects 
of study. Latin and Greek in particular are neglected more and more. 
Mathematics holds its own and even gains ground, because of the fact 
that it is essential to the prosecution of almost every branch of physical 
science. Rhetoric still has a place; philosophy, which is my own subject, 
is sharing the fate of Latin and Greek. And so we often hear it said 
that the American college is being transformed into a quite different in- 
stitution, and that ' ' liberal culture ' ' will in the course of a generation 



56 St. John's College Commencement and 

or two be wholly extinct. In other words, that we have definitely 
abandoned the ideal which our founders proposed themselves when they 
created the institutions for whose destiny we and our colleagues are 
now responsible. 

Is this charge true? I think not. A liberal education does not con- 
sist in pursuing any given group of studies, be they Latin, Greek, and 
mathematics, or any others whatsoever. Have you not often met men 
■who had been trained in these subjects, and yet betrayed hardly a trace 
of that culture which is acknowledged by all to be the proper outcome 
of a liberal education? And on the other hand, have you not often 
met men who had had no such education and yet possessed cultivated 
minds in the best sense of the word? Some subjects are, it is true, 
especially well adapted to be made the means of conveying a liberal 
education, and Latin, Greek, and mathematics are among them, but 
they are not the only ones. Indeed, there are scarcely any subjects which 
may not convey a liberal culture to minds fitted and anxious to receive it. 
Wherein then lies the essential distinction between an education which 
is liberal, and one which is not? 

It lies, first, in the motive which prompts and sustains its pursuit, 
and secondly in the methods which that motive necessarily suggests. The 
motive, the only motive which can ever lead a man to liberal education 
and true cultivation of mind, is the desire to know, the spirit of pure 
scientific curiosity. The mind that thirsts for learning will find what it 
desires in the most forbidding surroundings, and will press its way 
onward to its end in face of the most formidable diflS.culties. The mind 
that is dead to the things of the spirit, and alive to the things of sense 
only, that cares for nought but money, and position, and power, — or 
shall we say, for athletic distinction, elections to the best fraternities, 
and plenty of time to loaf with the boys, will never by any possibility 
acquire true cultivation. The best teachers may spread before it all 
the learning possessed by man it will all be in vain. As our homely 
proverb has it, you can drive a horse to water, but you cannot make 
him drink. 

In the second place, the methods to which these motives prompt are 
radically different. Let me give you a few illustrations. A boy goes 
to college because his parents wish him to, or because it's the proper 
thing to do, or because Tom, Dick, or Harry whom he knew at school 
have gone and say it's lots of fun and not much work, or because it 
permits him to delay going into business for four years, or because he 
has played on his school team and sees a prospect for greater honors 
before a larger audience on a college team. But of intellectual interests 
he has none. His sole aim in college is to get through with as little 
work as possible. So he elects " snap " courses, if such courses are 
to be had, and where they are not, he devises multifarious ways — I need 
not name them — of evading all honest work. Will he acquire a liberal 
education? And does it matter much what courses he does or does not 
pursue? 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 57 

Another goes to college because he intends to study medicine, and 
thinks a college course a good preparation for the medical school. And 
from the outset he selects with care those courses which will clearly 
aid him in the study of medicine. Of French and German he will take 
all he can get, if he has sense, for a physician must keep in touch with 
the progress of medicine in other lands; he will take chemistry, a little 
Latin, too, to help in writing prescriptions, and perhaps a year of 
Greek, because so many medical terms are derived from the Greek; a 
certain amount of chemistry, a good deal of botany and zoology. As 
for the rest of the course, — what interest is it to him? Now it is true 
that this man stands upon a much higher plane than the other. Such 
a selection of courses with reference to a definite end is perfectly 
justifiable; indeed, in most cases, it is very urgently to be recommended. 
But if the work be done without keen intellectual interest in the work 
for its own sake, and solely with a view to progress in his chosen pro- 
fession, the student will reap from it little or no culture. 

If, however, a boy goes to college because he feels that he is ignorant 
and desires an education, because his mind is aflame with the eager 
desire to know, which Aristotle ascribes to all men, the method and 
spirit of his work from beginning to end will be different. No matter 
what his ultimate end may be, no matter what the courses which he 
may decide to elect, he will always endeavor, not to pick up scraps of 
information which may some day be of service, but to master, so far 
as the time and opportunity allow, every subject which he undertakes. 
He will understand that in order to master any subject he must in the 
first place thoroughly learn its fundamental principles, those great 
generalizations by means of which the human mind sums up and grasps, 
once for all, an infinite mass of particular facts — such for example are 
the rules of grammar, the laws and formulae of physics and chemistry, 
the theorems of geometry and algebra, and so on. He will follow them 
also into the field of their special application, so far as is necessary to 
enable him to handle them aright. If he is studying sciences, which are 
as yet imperfect, such as history, economics, sociology, botany, zoology, 
psychology, which can offer him but few sound and well grounded general 
laws, he will nevertheless, while working over the masses of particular 
fact with which such sciences necessarily deal, ever be on the alert to 
find general principles underlying the mass of detail. 

And when in any given field, he has fairly well mastered all that has 
been done by his predecessors, the same love of learning which is his 
dominant motive will impel him to press forward to the discovery of new 
facts and the formulation of new laws. But this stage belongs of course 
to a later period in his development than that of which I am speaking. 

Is it not self-evident that a man who throughout his college life has 
been actuated by this motive and has employed these methods will 
reap from his four years in college a harvest that can be had in no 
other way? His mind will not necessarily be stuffed with facts, but 
it will be armed with weapons which will enable him to interpret the 



58 St. John's College Commencement and 

past, to deal with the present, and to some extent to forecast the future. 
The events and phenomena of the world he lives in, in so far as they 
fall within the sphere of the subjects which he has mastered, will not 
be mere isolated facts; each will be full of meaning to him, a link in a 
chain, a mesh in a net, in brief a member of a system which is part and 
parcel of his mental life. If this is not culture, what can culture be? 

A ' ' liberal education, ' ' ladies and gentlemen, is, then, an education 
in pure science. For * ' science ' ' is nothing other than systematized, 
generalized knowledge, and ' ' pure science ' ' is science or knowledge 
viewed as a thing in itself, quite apart from its application to practical 
ends. I do not mean to imply that science is forever to be kept isolated 
from all applications to practice, or that there is anything unworthy 
of the scholar's ideal in seeking practical application for his knowledge. 
I have often heard such views expressed; a friend of mine, for example, 
delights to maintain the paradoxical thesis that none but useless studies 
are useful in a liberal education; but I have no sympathy with it. Util- 
ity is the ultimate standard of all human activities; whatever is not 
useful is doomed to pass away. But we must beware of giving the 
words ' ' utility ' ' and ' ^ useful ' ' too narroAv or too low a meaning. 
The life of man is a complex of many tastes and instincts, suggesting 
diverse and sometimes conflicting ends, and prompting to many and 
varied forms of activity. Most of these ends and the activities which 
subserve them, from the aimless play of childhood, the athletic and other 
interests of young manhood, to the struggle for wealth, power, and dis- 
tinction of middle age, have their proper place and function in human 
life, and we may, I think, believe that all can be harmoniously co- 
ordinated in such manner as to lead us to that ultimate end, for the 
sake of which we live and move and have our being. But it does not 
by any means follow that the pursuit of knowledge should at every step 
be governed by reference to some such ends as these. Many arguments 
might be adduced to prove that it should not, but for the present I am 
concerned with one only. I take it for granted that intellectual culti- 
vation is an important end. It is not by any means the most important. 
The acquisition of a good moral character, for example, is far more 
important; indeed in many cases even the acquisition of some trade 
sufficient to earn a livelihood is more important. But it certainly is 
true that intellectual cultivation is one of the greatest blessings that can 
be conferred upon any man who has a mind fit to receive it, and that 
cultivation, I maintain, can be best acquired by the pursuit of knowl- 
edge, without immediate, present reference to its possible practical 
application. 

The designs of our founders then have not been abandoned, nor have 
they been replaced by others. They have been modified in form in order 
to meet conditions which our founders could not foresee, but in spirit 
and intention they are still effective. For two hundred and twenty- 
five years the torch of learning has burned in this historic, I had almost 
said consecrated, spot; hither have come the sons of Maryland and the 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 59 

sons of other states as well, each to light his taper at the sacred flame, 
and in the hands of many a one his taper's slender flame has burned 
ever more steadily and more brightly until its beams reached far be- 
yond the confines of the State, even of the country. The long line of 
illustrious sons of St. John's College sufficiently attests the faithful- 
ness with which the plans of her founders have been carried out in the 
past. Will you. Alumni and friends of St. John's, permit a stranger to 
ask you whether the light that has burned here so long is to be dimmed 
now, at this late date, for want of your timely aid? You all are aware 
of the heavy blow which fate has dealt St. John's in the course of the 
past winter. You know that without prompt assistance it will be im- 
possible for her, not only to increase her usefulness and to keep pace 
with the growth of the State as she ought to do, but even to maintain 
that measure of service which she has been able to render you in the 
past. It is but a small sum that she requires, — surely the loyalty of 
her sons and the pride of the State of Maryland in one of the most 
ancient institutions of learning now existing in this country should 
prove strong enough to provide that paltry sum. 

Gentlemen of the graduating class, I must in conclusion address to 
you a few words, more direct, more personal, than those which are meant 
for all friends of the higher education. This is in a very real sense 
your day, and it comes to you but once in a life time. In a few minutes 
these exercises will be over, and your commencement will have taken 
its place, with the four years of college life which have preceded it, in 
memory, and thereforward, forever, it will all be but a memory, rapidly 
receding into an ever dimmer past with the passing of the years. Yes, 
your college days are ended. But do not fancy that your education has 
ended. I remember, when my own senior year was drawing to its close. 
Professor Barker, who then occupied the chair of physics, made us a 
little farewell speech at the end of his last lecture, in the course of 
which he said, ' ' Eemember, young gentlemen, that although you have 
finished your elementary education, you are only just beginning your 
real education." At the time I think I believed him, in a sense, but I 
certainly had no such vivid realization of the truth of his words as I 
have now, as I review the twenty-two years that have slipped away 
since they v/ere uttered. It was true; my education was but just be- 
ginning, and I do not feel that it has as yet progressed very far. I am 
sure you all know from your own experience something of what I mean. 
Have you ever felt so learned as you did in Freshman year? Have you 
not found that this proud consciousness, of knowing so very much, 
diminished in Sophomore year, diminished still more in Junior year, and 
still more in Senior ytar? 

And so, I think, you will find it ever diminishing as you grow older 
and more truly wise. Some of you will, no doubt, devote yourselves to 
a life of study, others will enter the professions or business life, but 
whatever your calling, you may, if you will, continue to learn, and if you 
do, you will ever and anon catch glimpses, so to speak, down the illimit- 



60 St. John's College Commencement and 

able vistas that lead towards the Infinite Unknown. In these moments 
you will feel how utterly insignificant are all the boasted achievements 
of the human intellect. I trust that this realizing sense of your own 
littleness will often be borne home to you. For today there parade 
among us, adorned in all the proud panoply of scientific nomenclature, 
many shallow theories, theories which claim to make all the deepest 
mysteries of the universe and of man as simple as A, B, C, capable of 
comprehension by the meanest intellect. Young men, and especially 
young men of active minds and independent spirit, full of generous en- 
thusiasms, impatient of the slow progress of the past and eager to 
bring those happier days of which they dream, are I think in a peculiar 
sense disposed to accept these bold claims. But if you really continue 
the education here begun, ado to your stores of fact, reach the position 
where you can criticize and endeavor to amend the fundamental laws 
and generalizations which have been deduced from these facts, you will, 
I am sure, become in an ever increasing degree distrustful of all short, 
simple, and monosyllabic explanations of the system of the universe and 
of the destiny of man. You will suspect that in those regions into which 
science has not yet penetrated, which faith claims as her own, and of 
which she seems to have some dim apprehension, may be found the 
'' Great Secret " which man has sought since first he began to think. 
Then may you learn, where sight fails you, to live by faith, for you 
will, I am firmly convinced, find her a trustworthy guide, and will not 
in the end fail of your dearest hopes. 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 61 



By Allen H. St. Clair. 

"We stand today upon the very threshold of life. As we look back over 
the few past years we remember that when first we began our college 
career, the time which must be spent in the class-room seemed long, and 
we looked eagerly forward to the day when we could lay aside our books 
and take up the duty of a more active life. But our college days, with 
their freedom from care, and with the precepts which they have instilled 
into our minds, have been very happy days to us all. All too swiftly 
they have flown, and now we enter upon the real journey of life, — a 
journey that we shall not find easy, but full of trials and vexations. 

Today we stand at the fork of the roads, one leading to success, the 
other to failure, and now has come the time when we must choose be- 
tween these two roads, — between success and failure. 

Many thoughts arise in our minds. If it were possible, we would lift 
the veil of the future and find therein our destiny, but this is denied us; 
we must be content to wait to find what time may have in store for us, 
remembering that success is not won in a single day but that it is won 
through patient and earnest work. 

The heights by great men, reached and kept, 

Were not attained by sudden flight; 
But they, while their companions slept, 

Went toiling upward in the night. 

The twentieth century has but lately dawned. Who knows what great 
possibilities lie concealed within its embrace, waiting only for the touch 
of man, that they may at once come forth in all their splendor. The 
world is ever stretching forth its hands toward the willing one, beseech- 
ing him to clasp it and to enter upon that road which leads to success. 
We see the wonderful things which have been accomplished during the 
last hundred years, and feel that the twentieth century will be of still 
greater achievements and opportunities. And when the opportunities 
present themselves to us, let us not stand idly by and let them pass 
into the hands of more ambitious ones, thinking that others will soon 
present themselves. But let us eagerly grasp each one as it appears. 

Why do you stand and idly wait? 
Behold! the hour is growing late; 
Take thy rusty cycle down, 
And labor for a fadeless crown. 

One person enters life surrounded by all the advantages of wealth, 
another steeped in poverty, another with the heritage of a good name, 



62 St. John's College Commencement and 

another with the gift of genius; but it lies entirely with the person, 
himself whether he maintains that wealth, that poverty, or that good 
name. Some of those who in former years crossed over the threshold 
and began the battle of life, led on by ambition and zeal, have suc- 
cessfully passed through the many trials and vexations that beset, have 
risen step by step until they have reached that goal called success. 
Others with just as bright prospects have engaged in the same battle, 
but not possessing the same energy and determination have failed, 
fallen behind their fellow countrymen, and are today standing where' 
they stood at the beginning of this journey, or have even moved back- 
ward along the line of progress. We cannot help but see the great 
difference between these two classes, the one which has succeeded, and 
the one which has failed. But let us forget the possibility of failure 
and take as our ideal that class which has passed through the journey 
of life successfully. 

We have bright hoj)es and brilliant plans for the future, and now the 
opportunity has come for us to put them into practice, but in spite of 
this our hearts thrill with sadness when we realize that this is the last 
time we shall all assemble here. Our college career has ended, and all 
too soon has come the time when we must bid farewell to our dear 
Alma Mater. No more, as students, shall we traverse these halls which. 
have become so dear to us; no more listen to the familiar yells; no 
more witness the contests on the gridiron or the diamond. To the 
students of this college, whom we have learned to know and love as. 
brothers, we have now to say farewell. We must now leave the in- 
structors who have guided us over the rough and thorny paths and 
pointed us to fields vfhere we could unearth the gems of knowledge. 

Fellow students, remember that you have the honor of a noble Col- 
lege to uphold. St. John's seems now to be on the eve of a more 
illustrious career, and it depends on you, fellow students, to make this 
career one that every alumnus and friend shall be proud of. You will 
reap the more direct benefit, and it is to your interest that you prove 
yourselves worthy of your Alma Mater. Our ej^es will ever be upon 
you and we expect you to prove yourselves men, true to self and to 
St. John's. 

Mr. President, and members of the Faculty, you have been the archi- 
tects of that character building that shall develop the truest and most 
potent qualities of our manhood. For many of us the educational train- 
ing received under your guidance will be our only capital. You have 
endeavored to equip us with requisites for a career of responsibility and 
honorable achievement. We deeply appreciate the work you have done 
for us, and we trust the seed you have sown now lies in fruitful soil. 
As we step out by your side to fight the battle of life, may you con- 
tinue to follow us with kind interest and sympathy. 

But by far the saddest thought tq us is that the members of our 
class must now sever the tender chords which have bound us so closely 
to each other, and must now go out into the world with the loss of that 



One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Anniversary 63 

influence which our close association has exerted upon each other. Our 
associations here have been to us all a pleasure and a help. There have 
been times when some of us misunderstood each other's motives, times 
when perhaps we were jealous of each other's progress, but those times 
have passed. We are proud of the work our class has done, but let us 
not be content with this, but let us aim high and bring even greater 
laurels upon our Alma Mater. Day after day we will revive the 
memories of college life; day after day we shall recall incidents of our 
college career. 

Today we have learned to know and value each other better than ever 
before; Today a cJierished life is passing away; Today we must bid 
farewell to one another and enter that field of which we are now to 
become a part. 

Military Announcements were then made by the Adjutant. 

Singing Class Ode. 

Benediction by Eev. J. Gardner Murray, D. D., of Baltimore. 

Following the Commencement Exercises a beautiful and delightful 
luncheon was served at the house of the President, Dr. Thomas Fell. 
Mrs. Fell received the guests, assisted by Mrs. John Wirt Eandall, the 
wife of the President of the Board of Visitors, and all the visiting dele- 
gates, the Board of Visitors, with their wives, and the graduating class, 
together with a number of the Alumni attended. 



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